A Thing or Two About Elrond
by Crookneck
Summary: Oneshots involving everyone's favorite glowering elf lord. Interactions with Gandalf, Arwen, Celebrían, hobbitses, Gil-galad, and others, splattered across the timeline of all ages up to the Fourth. Tragedy, comedy, whumping, fluff, h/c, and biscuits will all be accounted for.
1. Heavy

**A Thing or Two About Elrond**

Collection of oneshots involving everyone's favorite glowering elf. Interactions with Gandalf, Arwen, Celebrían, hobbitses, and others, from the beginning of the First Age to the end of the Third. Angst, comedy, whumping, fluff, h/c, and biscuits are all accounted for.

**1: Heavy**

_One of many lesser adventures involving Elrond, Gandalf, and Saruman – or, my uneducated take on the events that first caused Gandalf to fear what would happen in the wake of Elrond's theoretical death, and also a prelude to Saruman's actions in LOTR. Elrond-whumping. Non-Slash. This first story is beastly in length but I could hardly have had it cleft in two. Then it would have been a twoshot, and everyone knows twoshots are silly. _

* * *

_T.A 2480_

_November the 10th_

"Tell Lord Elrond about how mama kill't the troll!" exclaimed the boy with one eye; his name was Nelo, unless Elrond's memory failed him. Elrond raised his eyebrows at Nelo.

"A troll?"

"Aye, she kill't it with her bare hands an' an ice pick!"

"A worthy campfire story," Elrond said, turning his gaze expectantly upon Makade, the boy's father who sat across the fire from Elrond. Makade had been amusing the party with memories of the dangers of Ettenmoor. Elrond suspected that this was the first night any of these people felt able to recall encounters with Ettenmoor creatures with enough enthusiasm to consider any of the stories to be a good yarn. That range, far north of his refuge of Imladris, had been thought to be unoccupied by humans after a myriad of wicked creatures claimed the lands. Thus it had been somewhat of a surprise when a ragged party of sixty men, women, and children had been spotted wandering dangerously close to the Trollshaws to the West of Imladris. Elrond had bidden them to Imladris for a respite, and there he had learned that they were the last 'hardy-as-an-oliphaunt's-foot' men of Ettenmoor. The invasion of the wicked creatures had finally become too much, and they now moved south, looking for a place to settle.

Elrond and the two wizards Gandalf and Saruman had counseled them to travel to Gondor's realm Isengard, as it was the closest safe outpost of men. As the men had no knowledge of the area, and as stories had come north to Imladris about the increasing number of goblins below the mountain Caradhras (near which they would be forced to pass on their way south), Elrond had volunteered to guide them along the safest route. He also sought an opportunity to visit Lord Celeborn and Lady Galadriel in Lórien to discuss the increasingly bothersome matter of Dol Guldor, and also to generally be a good son-in-law.

First task, however, was to get this band of people to Isengard. Saruman had volunteered to go as well, as soon as he'd heard that Elrond was to be their guide. The White Wizard had echoed Elrond's intentions on discussing important matters with the nobles of Lórien. Elrond was secretly relieved when Gandalf had immediately thereafter proclaimed his intentions of joining the party as well, for Elrond had never liked Saruman, from the moment the first meeting of the Second White Council had convened.

Thus it was that Elrond, Saruman, Gandalf, and sixty-odd Ettenmoor refugees had headed south from Imladris in the crisp of autumn, and thus it was that the same party was taking the night along the banks of the Glanduin in the shadow of the great Mountains of Moria, now more than halfway to their goal, spirits high. The night was cold but the people were hardy northerners – and Elrond was an elf – and no complaints were heard except from Nelo, who said his eye-patch wouldn't stay on straight. The lad had lost his eye on their journey to Imladris. The elven eye-patch he'd been given was doing what it was supposed to, but Nelo thought it felt crooked and nothing Elrond could say would supplant the idea.

The two wizards were not joining the party by the fire. Saruman didn't appear interested in conversing with the rough northern folk, and had asked for Gandalf's company instead. Light shown from within their tent down the bank a ways. Elrond regretted that the wizard was not to witness Makade's account of Nelo's mother jumping a troll from behind.

It was not wasted on Elrond that Nelo's mother herself was not present to tell the tale. Once Makade's story was done and the laughter around the fire had died into snickers and snorts, the elf watched grief pass through Makade's eyes, briefly.

"Good fire tonight," one of the men said. Murmurs of agreement from those huddled closest. Elrond thought for a moment before speaking, amusement in his voice.

"Nay, friends, this fire is smaller than those of past nights. Larger flames would attract unwelcome attention from the mountains." He gestured to the east for their benefit. The clouds lay thick atop them, creating the darkest of surroundings and he knew the people must be rather discombobulated in unfamiliar territory.

"Still," said one of the women, "this fire seems the warmest yet."

"Indeed," replied Elrond. "The first fire near which thoughts were warmed as well as food and feet."

"Well-said, elf!" shouted a man next to Elrond, thumping him heartily on the back and eliciting a cheer of accord from the others. He was beginning to realize that these people did everything heartily. They ate and drank heartily, marched heartily, sang heartily, argued heartily, and assuredly thumped their companions on the back heartily. They were crude folk with robust hearts. He didn't so much mind that they had taken to calling him 'elf'.

Smiling, he looked to the Wizards' tent, wishing Gandalf would come sit with them. Elrond knew these people were to Gandalf's liking as well. But the tent was closed, so Elrond tuned back to listen to the people begin to weave their memories into what he supposed would become a great tapestry of stories of the Ettenmoor that would someday be passed to their grandchildren.

Through a story of imps being told and through a chill westerly wind stirring the cane, Elrond first heard the cry. He swore his heart had not fallen so far for many years. Of course, he thought bitterly as he came to his feet, this happy moment would come to a more abrupt ending than it deserved. He gestured for silence; it was granted immediately. The air smelled of the marshlands to the west and of their horses, who were gathered near the circle of empty tents, and even his eyes could see no lights to alarm them of a danger, no glaring watchers from the forest to the east. And now no sounds save the wind in the cane, horse hooves shifting idly in the duff, and the very quiet murmurings of two very serious wizards.

"What?" someone finally ventured.

"Is anybody missing?" he asked, eyes scanning the crowd. All turned to their neighbor. Moments passed and no alarms were raised, and Elrond started to think about believing the noise had been a rabbit meeting the teeth of a predator. Then,

"Mishke… Mishke and Bezhég! Are they here?" cried a woman. The elf sighed. The young woman Mishke and young man Bezhég had been circling closer to each other for days now; Elrond had known it was only a matter of time before they would seek something warmer than a fire at night. He had warned the company to stay close while in the shadow of the mountains, but hadn't remembered to be wary of the fact that young humans thought they were invincible. Mishke and Bezhég were gone.

A sharp cry ripped the sudden taught air, away near the foot of the mountain. It was not the cry of lust released. It had been pushed by fear. Everyone stood and voices started to bubble into an uproar.

"Hush!" Elrond said, and the voices ceased. Faces turned to him. "Make no noise. Let us not advertise our alarm." He glanced back at the glowing tent where the wizards were. It seemed far away now, and he wasn't about to shout to them. Another cry split his concentration – louder this time, and longer. The mother of Mishke gasped and held her hand over her mouth.

"Nelo," he said, searching the crowd, and finding the boy. "Go quickly to the Wizards and tell them I've gone after Mishke and Bezhég, towards the mountains. Everyone swift on foot and with blade, follow me. Quietly." He had worn light armor for the ride south but had taken it off before starting the fire, a decision he now regretted. At least his blade still hung at his waist. He had hesitated to bring it from the outset - such was his desire never to have to draw a blade again - but Gandalf had insisted.

A group of twenty or so men followed as he made his way swiftly towards the foot of the mountain, into the forest. He knew it was hard for the men to see anything at all but to his surprise they kept up well enough, though not very quietly. Another shout, this time a cry for help, told him they'd come much closer to where the youngsters were than he'd thought, and also told him that something unpleasant was still happening to the one who made the noise. There was panic, and there were tears.

He caught a foul scent.

"Goblins," he said quietly to those in earshot, and though he'd known they'd come upon the creatures, his heart still fell. They had discussed the issue of goblins already, a few days ago. The men were sure they would be able to take on any goblins encountered, especially since they were used to dealing with the cruel goblins of the North. What Elrond hadn't been able to convince them of was that the goblins of this part of the Misty Mountains were bigger, smarter, and altogether more creative in their cruelty than those of Ettenmoor.

They came upon the sight too abruptly for Elrond to stop events from unfolding.

A boulder field lay before them, reaching up the foot of the mountain, the aftermath of a rock fall years ago. Stones jutted from the ground like sharp tombstones gathering to mutter together, some like stepping stones and others the size of great chariots. Crouching, bound, atop one of the larger boulders was Bezhég – that much Elrond could clearly see. The moment the boy heard them at the edge of the woods he cried out in fear again, causing the men behind Elrond to rush forward towards Bezhég's voice.

"Trap, it's a trap!" Elrond shouted, and tried to grab back those that had ventured forward, but he knew it was too late. Confused now, some men plunged blindly into the boulder field, some crowded near the elf. Elrond cursed, not used to leading blind men over dark boulder fields that were no doubt crawling with hungry goblins. He could smell their reek and could hear their breathing and shifting out in the boulders – and in the woods surrounding them.

He jumped into the boulder field. The goblins exploded into movement. He had to reach Bezhég, he was the only one that could see well enough to get there safely. A dark shape tripped into his vision and before he knew he'd drawn his blade, he cut it down and pushed it into another_, _asking the forgiveness of all the Eldars for breaking his long period of non-violence.

"Men, stand and fight!" he yelled, knowing that if they tried to venture further into the boulder field their footing would betray them and they would fall to the appetites of the goblins. They had a chance if they just stood still and could see well in the dark and were, like him, sure of foot. The men were at a major disadvantage.

Another creature lunged from a crack in the stones and seized him with all four limbs, almost throwing the elf's balance before he sent himself backwards into a boulder, scraping the goblin off to the ground, after which he swiftly dispatched it, only to look up and find two more flying over the stones towards him. Elrond let a frustrated growl pass his lips before his warrior muscle memory took the two down. He could deal with a few goblins but he knew there were more in the mountain. Get to Bezhég. Retreat to the protection of the wizards. Surely the wizards would be on their way by now.

Even as he allowed that small hope and made for Bezhég, he knew there was no way a group of men could outrun a horde of goblins in the dark of the forest.

Four goblins sprang from hiding right before he reached the lad. He'd been expecting a vanguard and the goblins were not expecting to deal with an elf. One of them grazed his neck with its strange spiked bludgeon but fell quickly with the others. The elf knelt by the lad.

"Are you hurt badly?" Elrond asked, cutting his bonds. Bezhég shook his head. His arms were quivering. "Where is Mishke?"

"Oh," Bezhég whimpered, and tried to say something but it appeared his horror had frozen his words. From the edge of the forest Elrond could hear the sounds of a skirmish and was relieved not to have heard any death-screams of man, yet.

"Tell me, is she dead?" Elrond insisted, bringing the boy to his feet. Bezhég nodded, the whites of his eyes shining. Something leapt at Elrond from behind and he managed to angle his blade for the goblin to impale itself, which it did, and came sliding down to the hilt, face to face with the blade's owner. Bezhég let out a strangled sound at the sight.

"Elf?" the goblin gurgled, its cruel weapon frozen in the air. Elrond twisted the blade and threw the goblin to the ground, but it lunged clumsily again. Such was the appetite of a goblin that it would spring for food even as its life flowed away. A dark thought entered his mind: such was the appetite of a goblin for _elf-_flesh. It plagued Elrond to know that elf-flesh was 'the sweetest', according to orcs and goblins and other such unpleasant creatures.

A new burst of conviction moved him to grab the young man and make for the forest. Goblins were leaping across the boulders like colossal lice, and more than he would have liked were leaping directly at himself and his charge. Bezhég was none too steady on his feet and the half of Elrond's mind that wasn't occupied with defending them was concentrating on not allowing Bezhég to break his foot while being dragged over the boulders to the group of men.

_Where are the wizards?_ Elrond thought desperately. The numbers of goblins did not appear to be decreasing. Three more down, four and five, Bezhég tripping and Elrond hauling him up and forward again. They were very close to joining the men now, but what then? What then?

**-)O(-**

For their part, the wizards had been having a perfectly irritating discussion about Elrond's value as part of the White Council. For some reason Gandalf could not yet fathom, the White Wizard had held a grudge against the elf since they'd all first met a number of years ago, not being helped by the fact that Elrond had held a grudge against the White Wizard since that time as well. They were both very reasonable and wise people and Gandalf simply could not understand the rift between them.

"Gandalf, my friend, I'm beginning to doubt the worth of Elrond of Rivendell as part of the White Council," Saruman had worried, and Gandalf had sputtered a bit before collecting his thoughts.

"Preposterous, if I may say so, Saruman. Elrond is a most valuable member."

"But why, when we have those both wiser and more powerful sitting with us, do we need _him_? He is an extra voice weighing our decisions down, and he creates much dissent."

"Dissent is not always bad. And I disagree, Saruman. If any one of us is to be said to sire dissent, I would argue that you yourself – "

"Come now, Gandalf. I lead the White Council, what else is expected? I simply don't see the need for extra members. I repeat, the lord and lady of Lórien are older and wiser and not as caught up in the matters of mortals and family."

"Saruman – "

"I don't mean to say that the matters of mortals and family are unimportant – quite the opposite – but they have no place in our council."

"Do you not remember that Elrond was present during the War of the Last Alliance, one of the most important times of any age? There were so precious few survivors to recount what happened, we should be grateful to count him among our council members."

And so on.

Gandalf had every respect for Saruman. The White Wizard was very wise and Gandalf was not about to dispute that. But Saruman did have his strange ideas and skirmishes with the world and some of its inhabitants. Gandalf was sorry that Elrond was one such person, for Gandalf found that he rather liked the elf. He liked most elves but Elrond's company in particular Gandalf had warmed up to in the past few decades. He suspected it had something to do with the fact that Elrond's blood was a rampant confluence of many peoples, but he wasn't sure yet. He would defend the elf right now, though, if only because the elf was not there to defend himself against Saruman's disapproval. He had no doubt Elrond would have had a few sharp words in reply.

Eventually Saruman started on about the elves' paranoia about Dol Guldor, and then about how perhaps it was Lórien's responsibility alone to defend the West against any threat from Mirkwood, since Lórien was the closest to the supposed danger. Gandalf was bothered by such thoughts coming from the powerful wizard but had little time to argue them. Something disturbed his spirit and he turned his head towards the east.

Footsteps were running towards their tent, quick ones. A child's steps. Gandalf stood, interrupting Saruman, and drew back the flap as young Nelo came bursting in, completely forgetting any manners he'd begun to pick up about etiquette in the presence of wizards.

"Sirs!" he gasped. "He, ah, he said…" Nelo's words failed him through panicked breath, and Gandalf knelt next to the boy.

"What is it, lad?"

"The, the elf, the Lord Elrond! He said, he said he went up into the mountain!"

"What? What has happened?"

"Mishke and Bezhég, we heard 'em! They're by the mountain!" The child was making little verbal sense but Gandalf could guess by the welling tears what had happened. The two mortals were gone. Elrond had gone after them. It was dark and the men would be stumbling. The potential for goblins by the mountain was high. They would need help. Gandalf got to his feet, nabbed his staff, and shot from the tent.

The knot of people by the fire was worried, clenched together, murmuring. The horses whinnied and the mountain in the east, shrouded in the night, shifted its pitiless gaze down to its base. Something was about to happen. Something _close_.

"Saruman," Gandalf called, meaning to ask him to defend the people while he himself took to the woods to assist Elrond, but Saruman had left the tent for the horses already, and now mounted his steed. "Saruman, leave your horse!" he called, but the White Wizard was gone, speeding towards the forest. Perhaps haste was best at this time, but Gandalf knew a horse would be of little use in the thick of the upstart woods, surrounded by goblins, who were well-known for their love of horse meat. Gandalf went to the people, who stared at him with wide eyes. He attempted a smile.

"There now, everyone, Saruman's gone to find your missing friends. They will be back soon." His words had hardly fallen from his mouth when from behind them the horses screamed and Gandalf turned to the reflection of dozens of eyes, coming down from the north and enveloping the animals. Gandalf cursed himself, wondering how it was that he hadn't smelled their approach. Lunging forward and wielding his staff, he cast a terrible glow over the scene, which served to make some goblins shrink away, but only made others angrier at being denied a meal – though some of the horses had already been taken down, filling the night with their abrupt screams. In the distance he heard the beginnings of steel on rock and knew that Elrond had entered the company of goblins.

He realized there were very few men among them now that were able to wield blades – a few of the women carried shortswords but it wouldn't be enough to protect the company if Gandalf left them to save their mounts. He stood his ground near the fire and cast the glow as far as he could, wishing the horses to him and the goblins away. Some of the goblins followed and the Grey Wizard flung them back into the night. More came from the shadows. He could hold them, yes, and defend the people and the remaining horses now, but he was helpless for Elrond and the rest of the company. He trusted Saruman to bring them back safely.

Minutes passed like dark, sluggish clouds, and nobody returned from the forest. The goblins had ceased their attack on the company by the fire, but Gandalf dared not leave. He knew the numbers these goblins were capable of producing. Once the rest got back they would have to ride hard for the south and west, away from where goblins would venture. Which may be a far ways away, Gandalf lamented. Part of the reason he'd come was to observe the territories of the recent unpleasant creatures who had taken up land between Imladris, Mirkwood, and Isengard. He ordered the people to gather up any belongings, leave the tents (they would now have to double up on horses and would have no room for tents), and be ready to fly on a moment's notice.

Time crept wickedly as they waited, and it seemed ages passed before noises from the forest reached his ears again. Only moments, he told himself, and strained his eyes and the glow of his staff to the east. There, there they were! Finally, out came the men who had accompanied Elrond. They were moving none too quickly, however, and had with them some wounded. All were on their feet, which Gandalf saw with relief, as they'd have to ride hard very soon. Saruman, white robes glaring, moved with them, now without the horse, and instead supporting a wounded person, their arm draped over the wizard's neck. Gandalf muttered darkly to himself, counting the remaining beasts and wondering if they'd even all fit on the horses they had left. They would have to.

The fighters returned now, gasping and limping and holding their wounds.

"Is there anyone…" Gandalf began to ask them, but saw that, yes, he'd underestimated their injuries, and there were a few whose legs would not hold them now that they were back to the fire. One was the boy Bezhég, who looked to be loosing much of his nerve but also looked relatively whole. Two men hit the ground in rapid succession and Gandalf started towards them.

"Elrond," Gandalf said loudly, beckoning the elf towards him, wherever he may be. "Any healers," he added, and knelt down next to the first man. Blood came out of the victim's mouth and Gandalf, laying a hand on his chest, could feel the life energy slipping away. "Elrond!" he shouted. This man had deep wounds. Gandalf feared the worst. He also feared staying here longer than necessary. One of the women, in her waning years and grey of hair but still strong of body, appeared kneeling at Gandalf's side, and had with her a bag of gauze and herbs.

"Master Gandalf, I can help. Elrond is – "

"Yes, where is that elf?" Gandalf grumbled.

"He is behind you, sir."

The Grey Wizard turned to see only white robes flecked with red, gauzy in his face, and then Saruman's blasted flowing sleeves shifted and Gandalf could see that the White Wizard was lowering Elrond to the ground.

"Rot it all, _no!_" Gandalf spat, dread tearing at his heart. "By the blade of a goblin is _not _an acceptable way for an elf lord to die," he stated, but quickly and to his profound relief realized that the elf was not about to die; there was a wound, yes, blood stained the elf's entire tunic front dark, but he knelt next to Gandalf all the same.

"Elrond, how badly – "

"I will live," Elrond interrupted him. His hands were already peeling back the cloth around the bloody gash of the man on the ground. "Unlike this mortal," he murmured after a moment. "Too much blood…" Gandalf went to the other man, who was lying on the ground and staring wide-eyed at his dying companion, who Elrond gently eased into a state of peace before murmuring an almost inaudible blessing and closing the man's eyes.

The second man, luckily, had no mortal wounds. His leg had been ripped brutally and he could not walk on it, and he had some nasty chew marks on his right shoulder, but these were relatively simple to remedy and Gandalf let the woman healer and Elrond take care of him. The wizard stood, and together with Saruman started to urge people onto their horses. One other man fell in the process, goblin-inflicted wounds taking their toll. The wizard ordered another to take him over to the two healers. Gandalf could hear angry cries from the mountains, the sound of goblins boiling up from beneath, hungry.

"Up! Up, mount the horses, we ride now!" Gandalf shouted. He grabbed the reins of one of the beasts and made to step into the saddle when an urgent little hand clamped down on his arm. He turned. It was the woman healer.

"Yes?'

"Sir, the elf is wounded," she said, pointing to where the newest addition of the wounded had been deposited. The last man looked like he would be fine, if his foot could be sewn back together soon, and if the compress he'd been given for his head wound wasn't lost in all this jostling about.

"I know. He will be fine. Elves are – … oh." Gandalf pushed past her. Elrond was still on his knees and looking none too able to get up. "My friend, you must stand, we need to move," he insisted. The wizard crouched and pushed back the blind of dark hair to measure the elf's face, and was not pleased with what he saw. Elrond was not as well as he had wanted Gandalf to believe. His skin was pale, very pale, and his hands grasped at something protruding from his torso. The butt of the missile had already been broken off close to Elrond's body. Everything Gandalf could see below the elf's neck was crimson. There was no time, however, for careful ministrations.

"Can you stand?" the wizard asked again, letting urgency force his voice. He didn't listen for an answer and instead did his best to pull the elf to his feet. Elrond reached out with one hand to steady himself on Gandalf's arm. At least his grip was still strong, though it left a great bloody smear on Gandalf's sleeve. The woman healer was trying to check beneath Elrond's other hand to see what it was that was lodged in his chest, and Gandalf scanned the grounds. Most were on horses now. Women and children rode together, there was Saruman sitting solo on another horse. The two wounded men on the ground still hadn't been claimed by anybody. Gandalf transferred Elrond's hand to the reins of his horse.

"The goblins," gasped Elrond through his teeth. Gandalf put a hand on Elrond's back in acknowledgment, gazing into the forest. He could hear their approach, no doubt only moments away from emerging. The wizard stepped into the mass of riders and animals.

"Who will ride with the wounded? Who is strong enough? Quickly now!"

After a moment a few riders had gathered close to volunteer themselves to take 'the elf', and Gandalf smiled that Elrond had so quickly endeared himself to these people. He turned to Elrond but the elf's head was resting against the horse's neck and Gandalf feared that soon he would be back on the ground.

White robes once again flapped in front of his face and Gandalf's gaze alit on Saruman, up on the horse, gazing down at them, and Gandalf may have been mistaken when he thought he saw a brief curl of the lip, but then again, the White Wizard's whiskers were obscuring his features and Gandalf wasn't about to stare at a time like this.

"I will take him," said Saruman definitively, and reached a hand down for Elrond to grasp, ivory sleeves stained red now, but the elf did not come forward.

Something in Gandalf's heart tightened a little.

"Saruman, ride out front," he urged. "Guide them south, now, while there's still time to escape! We will take the wounded and follow. Go!" With that he turned and helped the woman healer to haul the two men unsteadily to their feet, all the while hoping Saruman would take his words and run, but it was a moment before he heard Saruman's mount strike off into the dark. The weight that left his chest with that noise surprised Gandalf.

"I will take Elrond," he gasped, as he and the woman healer helped to push the wounded men into place in front of the riders of the other mounts, "as I am old and frail. Elves are not so heavy as men, it will be easier for me to keep him." Frail the wizard was not, but it wasn't every man Gandalf would venture to trust with a wounded elf lord. Including, apparently, Saruman, a matter upon which Gandalf would meditate at a later time.

A sharp war cry from the forest. Gandalf aimed his staff at the edge of the woods and saw hundreds of sharp teeth reflecting from the shadows, only temporarily put off by the glow.

"We must fly. Elrond, up now." The elf lord made an honest attempt at mounting the horse but clearly much of his strength was leaving him, and the thing in his chest was making movement terribly difficult. The woman healer and Gandalf managed to pull him into place – Elrond's man-blood lent him more heft than an ordinary elf, but still he was easier to maneuver than the other two injured – after which the woman jumped lithe behind the remaining solo rider. Gandalf mounted up behind Elrond, ignoring the fact that the pale horse's hide was already stained in front of the elf, and wasted no time grabbing the reins in one hand and kicking his horse into action, following the trail of the other riders as they fled, and Saruman's staff glaring bright in front. With his other arm he held out his glowing staff, doing his best to keep the goblins at bay behind them.

The goblins took to their trail despite the light. The riders plunged at a full gallop into and across the Glanduin, which was thankfully low now in autumn, and the goblins followed gamely. Their arrows flew, and Gandalf was surprised it had taken them this long to get archers out in front. The vile weapons whistled past close, almost tangling his grey mane – still short and slightly crooked and not at all sharp, noted the wizard, relieved that at least when it came to missile weapons goblins were still near the bottom rung. The backs of the riders in front of them got closer and as they sped southwest and pulled from the shadow of the mountain the arrows stopped snatching at their cloaks and the noises of pursuit fell away. Gandalf gratefully pulled his staff hand around to grab the reins as well, now locking the elf lord safer between his two arms. Elrond had his fingers twined into the mane of the horse and was bent over its neck, not looking a bit like he was thinking of falling off.

"I thank you for not passing out, Elrond," Gandalf cried into the elf's ear. "I would not have had a limb with which to keep you on the horse!"

"Are you calling me heavy?" the elf wheezed as loudly as he could, but his voice was still almost stolen by the sound of their flight. Gandalf chuckled.

"On the contrary! The wind would have absconded with you."

The elf did not reply, and instead leaned to the side and spat blood. Gandalf's relief at having briefly evaded the goblins was replaced once again with worry.

"What have you been hit with?" asked Gandalf. "The goblin arrows are short and thin, and their points are not winged. It will easily be removed when we stop next."

"Not a goblin arrow," Elrond said, sounding rather peeved about it, but his voice was weakening. "…stuck, whatever it is…" One of his hands slipped from the mane, slick with blood, and he fell forward some with an ill-stifled cry of pain. His hands found the horse's neck and he pushed himself up again but his arms shook and Gandalf observed that the elf was measuring his breaths very carefully.

Elrond had lost a terrible amount of blood. The evidence of that was rather clear. What cruel deeds the missile was wreaking inside the elf were not known but Gandalf was not prepared to be optimistic. Guessing by the thing's position, Elrond's heart and main arteries had been spared but he could not say for certain that his lung shared the same fate, and almost assuredly a large part of the liver was destroyed, which would explain the amount of blood. Gandalf could do nothing, however, until they stopped.

Elrond's grip on the horse's mane failed again. The wizard took the reins in one hand and with his other drew the elf against him. Loss of blood and sharp autumn wind had finally provoked Elrond into a fit of tremors.

_Heal thyself_, Gandalf commanded, and there was a brief surge of energy from within the elf, a warmth beneath Gandalf's gloved forearm across Elrond's torso, but it lasted only moments, and when it gave up and slipped away Gandalf felt Elrond's spine begin to slacken.

"No," he said, "this is not your fall, my friend. Hold on." Elrond's hand found Gandalf's wrist and held on stubbornly, but no strength came to straighten his back. _Cruel, cruel_, Gandalf cursed to nobody. To live through the incredible Barad-dûr only to be brought down by mere goblins was simply not fair. To have established Imladris and maintained that refuge and stronghold with such fortitude for so many centuries. To have fostered and raised countless heirs of Isildur to their thrones, generations upon generations. To have been wed to surely the most pure and beautiful she-elf on Middle Earth and to have sired three children whose destinies Gandalf had felt mark the chambers of his heart upon first meeting them. How he knew this Gandalf would not guess at but Elrond, despite having already seen seeds he himself had planted in the far distant past grow to be immoveable ideas and chapters of history itself, was not done in the great garden of Arda yet. Vital things were left to be sown. The wizard could feel them, small fates curled and vexed and waiting within Elrond's core.

With apprehension Gandalf felt a great void yet to be hollowed, too. _Heavy miseries will fall upon him,_ it told the wizard. _Very soon and close. _

Now Gandalf shivered. He feared for his friend, should this injury spare Elrond's life.

The elf had fallen slack now, and despite Elrond's negligible heft, Gandalf struggled to keep the reins, his glowing staff, and his friend in order before him. Gandalf looked behind them. No goblins in sight. Off to his side rode the woman healer and another.

"Halt with me! My friend is fading," he shouted over to them, and they pulled their horses to a stop behind a thicket of trees. Pathetic cover from goblins, but better than open field. Together they managed to take Elrond from the horse and lay him on the ground, where the glow of his ashen face disturbed their already troubled minds.

"What is your name?" Gandalf asked the man who had taken the reins of the other horse.

"Waubad, your lordship."

"Our lordship lies at our feet, Waubad. Call me Gandalf. Keep a watch for goblins. And your name?" he asked the woman healer.

"Caree."

"Bless you, Caree. I need to talk some sense into this elf. Would you…" he asked, gesturing to the wound. She nodded and began pulling away the fabric. Gandalf hung over Elrond and placed a hand to the elf's face. The temperature of the skin was haunting the uneasy realm between lively warmth and the first cold shadows of death.

"Elrond."

The elf's eyes were half-lidded and distracted. He did not respond.

"Elrond Peredhel, I command your attention!" The eyes started to focus. Caree, who had exposed the wound, tweaked the broken missile shaft and the elf took a sharp breath, twisting. Both elves and wizards knew the importance of mentality when it came to healing, knew that the body would not heal until the mind gave it the freedom to do so.

"Look at me," the Wizard continued. "I have something of great importance to tell you. Great importance." Hopefully Elrond's stubborn sense of responsibility would drag him back to reality to listen. His eyes shuttered themselves tight for a breath, then opened, and found some focus in Gandalf's face. Gandalf waited, holding his tongue and peering into the elf.

"… _what?_" Elrond wheezed, with some exasperation. Good. He was back, for now.

"I just wanted to make sure you knew that you have absolutely no right to give up, Master Elrond." The elf's eyes shut again and he grit his teeth as Caree tugged at the shaft. "When your heart begins to stumble, so do the circles of the world," the wizard continued quietly, unsure if the elf was able to hear his voice.

"As they do when any heart stumbles," Elrond replied through his teeth, and his words struck precisely upon the deep chime in Gandalf's core, a place he forbade entrance to save for only a handful of trusted companions. The wizard brushed a dark lock from the elf's face.

"We are in accord, then," he said, and meant it deeply. He turned his focus to Caree. "How does it come?"

"It doesn't, sir. It's hooked in his ribs."

"Waubad, anything?"

"Don't see any goblins yet, Gandalf," the man replied. Gandalf bent to take a look at the missile. Yes, it was lodged between two lower ribs. Yes, it had certainly lain to ruin a good part of the liver. No more blood had passed the elf's lips so Gandalf assumed any damage done to the lung was minimal. He wrapped his hand around the broken shaft and tried to maneuver it but found that what he couldn't see of the weapon must have been bigger than he'd assumed. As Elrond had stated, definitely not a typical goblin arrow. He stopped tugging at it (to Elrond's vast relief) and simply laid his hands over it, and concentrated.

_Metal shrieks. The falcon tucks its wings and dives._

Gandalf's eyebrows sunk low. Surely curved broadhead arrows had not fallen into the hands of goblins. And yet he sensed twisted metal beneath his palms. Elrond's hand snatched at his sleeve.

"Gandalf…" was all the elf said but a look at his face made Gandalf turn and peer beyond the trees, to the north and east. Waubad faced him.

"I think I hear something," said the man.

"And I smell something," said Gandalf. Fleetingly he thought to stand his ground and banish the goblins, but he knew there was every possibility that there were too many of them, and he didn't think the others that had ridden ahead would know of their predicament until too late. A sharp breath behind him made Gandalf turn to see the elf lord pushing himself up.

"Down, back down," he said, but the elf resisted.

"We must leave." The noises behind them were getting louder – snarls, chain being jostled, rushes and canes snapping beneath claws. Gandalf sighed.

"Yes. You're right. I am sorry," he said, as he hefted the unsteady elf to his feet, "that we could not remove the blasted thing."

Elrond flapped his bloody hand in dismissal, silently forgiving all. Once again he was pulled onto the horse by the three other riders, who mounted up afterwards and shot from the cover of the trees, Gandalf's staff glowing, eliciting goblin screeches and further war cries. Strange that the goblins would follow them this far from their mountain home. Soon enough the brutes would have to fall back. Hopefully quite soon. They could keep ahead of the goblins without trouble but that was no longer Gandalf's chief concern. Elrond's spine had straightened again, whether out of abdominal pain or returning strength the wizard couldn't tell. Perhaps the elf's healing abilities were finally coming to surface here.

"Tell me of your wife," Gandalf said in the elf's ear, knowing that images of beauty did much for an elf's spirit to bolster the healing of the body. Elrond did not reply at first, but Gandalf waited.

"She is more fair," Elrond replied quietly, "than the elanor blossoms of Lothlórien… kinder to the eyes and spirit and more gentle to the touch… the purity of her spirit thrives in all things beautiful." Gandalf could feel the love Elrond had for his wife warming the elf from within.

"And tell me of your daughter."

"Arwen is starlight upon water at peace," Elrond replied without hesitation, and was silent.

"And of your twin sons."

"Vase-smashing scoundrels," he wheezed, but there was fondness in his voice, and Gandalf knew he'd set the elf's mind to meditate on good things. Gandalf and the other mount drew near to the main party, still riding, and they rode on for a long time until they had come fully into the embrace of the hills of Enedwaith and could no longer sense the shadow of the mountains behind them.

Saruman had sensed as well that it was safe to stop, and they circled around, staring to the northeast for long moments. No noises were heard and no foul air met them, though the westerly wind did not favor them this night. Now that they'd stopped, Mishke's mother could no longer contain her pain and started an unnerving wail that cleaved the air softly and filled many hearts with sorrow.

"We have outridden the danger," announced the White Wizard. "Break camp. We will stay here awhile and recover our wits. Get the wounded into a tent and out of the wind." The wind bit colder at them as night became deeper. The last folk of the Ettenmoor did as they were bid, and soon the few tents they'd brought were set, small fires were lit, the horses were secured (and well-guarded), and Gandalf was settled into a warming tent that sheltered the two men with debilitating wounds, Elrond, and Caree. The only light was from a single torch in the center of the tent, making it awkward and difficult to maneuver the shadows out of the way. Upon Gandalf's request Caree had gotten busy mending the two men. Gandalf stuffed blankets under the elf's back so he was half-sitting, and then began to ponder the most efficient way of wresting the broken missile from its stubborn position in Elrond's chest. Elrond himself seemed preoccupied with observing Caree's ministrations, though he said nothing and did not look worried, but did look slightly woozy. Mishke's mother was still wailing outside and the elf blinked each time her sobs started anew.

"As a far superior healer, Lord Elrond, your input on your situation would be most appreciated," grumbled the wizard, stumped. The only way he could figure on removing the shaft was in an unpleasantly destructive and painful manner, and he was hoping Elrond could bring to light another suggestion. The elf glanced down upon his chest and picked delicately at the slivers of the shaft, biting back a wince. The corners of his mouth turned down.

"This is no complex situation," the elf replied. "There is but one way out, as you have guessed. I am no stranger to such wounds; I would have it pulled without hesitation." He did not look overly bothered by the thought but did look faint. Gandalf had been fearing that answer. The tent flap opened and Saruman entered, having finally settled the camp to an order of his liking.

"How are our wounded charges?" he asked, and his gaze settled on Caree.

"Better, my lord. The men here will be well again, given some rest."

"Good. How fortunate that we have you on hand." Saruman turned to face Gandalf and Elrond and his eyebrows crawled up his forehead. "The arrow still vexes you, Lord Elrond. Why has it not yet been removed?" To Gandalf's great alarm, the White Wizard then tossed his outer robe to the side and started to push his sleeves up, all the while gazing down upon the protruding shaft. He meant to take things into his own hands. Perhaps it was better that way. Saruman was not one to dither about. Gandalf looked to the elf for a reaction. Elrond's face was stony but allowed a spark of fear to jump at Gandalf, and then the wizard heard words in his head:

_Take it out now, _the elf begged. _I would rather your hands than his._

Gandalf wondered why Elrond did not trust the White Wizard.

_Please!_

Surely, thought Gandalf, Saruman had a firmer grasp than he himself did.

_Mithrandir –_

Saruman had poised himself above the elf, reaching for the arrow, and Elrond canceled his plea to brace himself. Gandalf placed a hand on Elrond's arm.

"It is a curved broadhead," he said to Saruman, as the other wizard peered close at the wound. Caree had drawn up to watch over Gandalf's shoulder, concerned, as Gandalf continued. "How the goblins got their hands on such a missile I cannot guess. It has lodged between two ribs and won't be removed easily."

"Yet remove it we must," said Saruman. He took the broken end of the shaft in his hand like the hilt of a sword and placed his other upon the elf's sternum, and Elrond had only time to close his eyes and make hands into fists before Saruman gave a mighty twist and wrenched at the arrow.

The arrow did not come free; the action only renewed the flow of blood. To Gandalf's everlasting wonder, Elrond did not cry out. Saruman repositioned and twisted the thing at a different angle; a spasm moved the elf's body and Gandalf once again put his hand to the pallid face to give what comfort he could. The arrow was still stubborn, however, and after another twist and tug Gandalf could see that pain was taking its toll; Elrond's mind had been sent drifting. Maybe that was not so bad.

A heated snarl left Saruman's lips and his next wrench was very savage. Gandalf heard the crack of a rib fracturing and one of the tines finally emerged, bloody. The white wizard saw this and with one last tug drew the thing finally from the elf's chest. A thin, quivering strand of crimson stretched from its tip to the wound, sagged, and finally snapped to drop onto Elrond's darkened tunic.

"That was none too gentle, my friend," said Gandalf, relieved that the arrow was finally out but sickened by the process.

"Some things," panted Saruman, "cannot be so." He turned aside to lay the arrow down and accept a rag from Caree to wipe the blood from his hands.

"It is done, Lord Elrond," Gandalf said, and waited for a reaction. The ability of elves to withstand considerable pain was well-known to Gandalf, and so to see that pain had stricken Elrond from awareness was unsettling. The elf twisted slightly, teeth on edge, still caught in the aftershocks. He gave no sign of having heard Gandalf. His breath came hitched. "It is uphill from here," he tried again, though looking at the crater in the elf's ribcage, it would be no picnic of a hike. Elrond lay more still and his hands fell to the sides as Caree came forward again with a bowl of fire-warmed water and rags. His eyes did not open.

"Lord Elrond," said Gandalf again.

_I live,_ the tired voice responded, finally, and from a distance. _Let that be well enough for now. _The elf sounded stretched, so Gandalf fell silent and leant his mind and hands to the task of damage repair. Saruman had left the tent after having done what Gandalf had feared to do. The arrowhead lay on the ground where it had been cast.

Outside, the woman still cried, though quieter now. With her grief in the background they cut away the ruined tunic and wiped blood from skin. The ribs were deemed fractured but not broken. Gandalf assured Caree that, as Elrond was an elf, the internal injuries that looked so ghastly right now would soon become less dire and there was no measure they could take to speed the process more, besides cleaning the torn area and covering it with gauze, if only to keep the blankets they placed over him from becoming soiled with blood.

Quick hours after Gandalf had bid Caree to retire for rest, during which the woman outside had finally fallen silent, the sun was approaching the eastern horizon and the tent was filled with the dim light of dawn's blue hour. Gandalf stifled the urge to take out his pipe-weed and instead whiled the time away pondering. The movements of orcs and goblins. His strange mistrust of Saruman before they had taken flight the night before, and his turn-about with allowing Saruman to, against Elrond's wishes, deal with the arrow. The mistrust between these two Wise. The veiled fates yet unfurled within the elf. The awful mountain Caradhras, and how though they'd left its shadow far behind, part of its darkness had clung to Elrond's aura. And how soundly the elf's words had struck him the night before, after Gandalf had reminded him not to give up.

He could not understand what lay between Saruman and Elrond. He was missing something.

These thoughts clicked against each other like marbles in his mind. He turned them over and over, yet he could not make them into pearls. Cold mysteries for a cold morning.

Elrond had not stirred, and neither had any of the other inhabitants under the tent. One stirred from outside, though. One of the humans shifted around in the morning cold and left their blankets. They made their way slowly to the tent Gandalf was watching over, trying ever so hard not to make a noise, and then tripping over a guy-line before poking his head into the flap. The boy startled to see Gandalf awake and watching with amusement.

"Come in," Gandalf said. The boy entered. This was Bezhég, the awkward, lanky young man who had gone missing last night with poor Mishke. His wild blonde hair was barely contained beneath a woolen cap. He had scratches on his face and a bandage wrapped about his wrist and he was limping somewhat, but his cheeks glowed and his eyes were bright, and sad.

"Sit," Gandalf requested, trying to keep his smile in check. The boy sat. "What troubles you at this hour of the morning?"

"Nothing."

"Young man, you are the very picture of one troubled." Bezhég's face fell. Many thoughts crowded to be said – or confessed. He looked at the prone form of the elf, how grey his face was, and the boy's eyes bugged out a little.

"Is Lord Elrond going to live?" was his first question, and his voice cracked. The easiest of all that he wanted to say, no doubt.

"Elrond is quite alright."

"Good," he exclaimed with obvious relief.

A silence. Gandalf waited.

"B-because if he'd died I would have felt really bad."

"As we all would have."

"I mean me especially. If… If we hadn't gone out there in the first place…"

"They probably still would have come."

"But they would have come to the camp. You would have been there to protect us."

"True," said Gandalf. He wished now very much for some pipe-weed, but still he only sat, watching the shadows cast by the torch dance on the bodies of those in the tent. "Have you slept any this night, Bezhég? Or have you stayed up wrapping yourself in guilt?" The boy didn't answer. "What happened is the fault of nobody, only the tragic joining of circumstance." Gandalf didn't completely agree with what he'd just said but troubling the boy further would do no good.

"It's my fault Mishke is dead," he finally sighed, and a little sob sprang unbidden from his lips. This wouldn't do, and the boy clamped his lips shut in denial.

"If fault will be placed upon anybody," Gandalf said, "you may share the burden with Mishke, who agreed to accompany you into the night, and with your people, who paid no attention to your whereabouts. And with Elrond, who was to guide you safely to Isengard without incident."

"You're just saying that to make me feel better."

"I'm saying that to show you the folly in your thoughts. You must understand that no action is without consequence, and nothing takes place by itself. You may as well blame Durin's Bane itself for preparing such a mountain to host beasts such as goblins and orcs. Blame Durin the Deathless for founding the blasted place. Blame must then be flung far and wide, must it not, to account for all the forces that came together for this tragedy to occur. Blame Morgoth, if you want, for it was he who supposedly raised the mountains into being in the first place."

"Melkor…" rasped a voice and both Gandalf and Bezhég turned in surprise.

"Lord Elrond?" asked the boy. The elf's eyes were still closed and he hadn't moved any, but now he drew a small breath.

"It was Melkor, not Morgoth," he said, though his quiet rasp was not easy to catch. Bezhég looked visibly relieved to see Elrond awake. Gandalf, who had known Elrond had been awake but in a state of meditation, was merely slightly irritated.

"My dear crippled friend, they are one in the same," he huffed

"You disregard his fall from on high…" said Elrond quietly and now opened his eyes to glare at his friend. "Is an egg no different than an eagle?… Or a slain eagle no different from the earth upon which she falls?"

Gandalf, realizing Elrond's intention, smiled and shifted his gaze to the boy, who looked utterly perplexed. Possibly too perplexed, and too intimidated in the presence of two of the so-called 'Wise', to think straight. The wizard took pity.

"What Elrond is trying to say, my boy, if I may decipher his cryptic and no doubt fatigue-induced rambling for you, is that, in a word, you may either believe that everything is everything, or..." He stopped as he realized that no doubt these words made as much sense to the boy as Elrond's had.

"Are pickles no different than cucumbers?" Elrond continued.

"Quiet, Lord Elrond, you confuse the lad."

"A joint effort," the elf murmured. Elrond closed his eyes again and fell silent, a poorly concealed smile upon his lips.

"Really, my lad," tried Gandalf again, "what we would both have you understand is that we don't wish you to let these happenings weigh your heart. Grow from them and the world that now seems widdershins will reveal itself to you as a swift and resolute cycle. Though my words may mean little to you now, you'd do well to remember them, and come back to them."

Admirably, the lad's eyebrows knit together as he thought, committing the words to memory. Perhaps there was hope for the boy after all, thought Gandalf. Perhaps someday those words would come back to save him. Perhaps someday he will find that the words of the wise were sometimes simply the ramblings of the moment.

"Lord Elrond?" he ventured, voice small.

"Yes, Bezhég," was the equally small answer.

"Thank you for saving my life." Elrond's eyes opened, and all amusement had left them. He struggled once again to sit up, and Gandalf replaced the mass of blankets that had propped him up before. Gandalf did not think he should be shifting so soon, and the elf closed his eyes and took a shaky breath before reopening them and speaking.

"Your gratitude warms my heart," he started. "Please remember that it is not a heroic act to save another's life. It is simply a necessary action for one who wishes to be worthy of their own." He held the young man's gaze for a moment before closing his eyes again. The boy wanted to say something more but thought better of it. Instead he reached forward and set something on the blanket on top of Elrond's middle. The elf slowly picked the object up. It was the size of a chestnut, and had a leather cord looped through it.

"I carved that last night," the boy said, and the words almost tripped on themselves on their way out of his mouth. "It's supposed to be a bezhég leaf, from the Ettenmoor." The lad was blushing furiously now, possibly because he had dared to give a crude carving to an elf, when elves were renowned for such skills. "I-I figured… I'm… if you ever need anything… I'll help. If I can." He furiously scratched the front of his forehead, which conveniently hid his face from the gaze of the elf and the wizard.

Gandalf looked sideways at Elrond, who was observing the leaf carving on the cord with a look of true awe in his eyes. His smile then – not in mere amusement – was genuine. Small, but without a doubt true. He looked to Bezhég.

"Thank you. Thank you very much. This is beautiful craftsmanship." And he meant it, too. The lad fairly glowed. "I'll keep it near," he continued, and put the loop of cord around his wrist. Bezhég bowed his head and stood, bowed again, and abruptly left the tent. Gandalf raised his eyebrows at the exit, and looked to Elrond.

"He is crying now," Elrond said sadly, listening.

"Crying is better than being afraid to cry."

Elrond looked up from the carved leaf around his wrist and watched the wizard. Gandalf listened to the outside world while he waited for the elf to say something. People were starting to wake up. They would probably wonder if they were staying put or if they would move. Gandalf himself didn't know that; he would discuss the matter with Saruman when he came into the tent to check on Elrond, which would probably be quite soon.

"Thank you for riding with me last night," the elf finally said. "And thank you for sitting with me."

"Oh, it was nothing. I didn't do much, just kept you atop the horse. I couldn't even bring myself to remove the arrow." A shadow crossed over Elrond's face and Gandalf almost regretted bring up the subject, but now was a good time, now while Saruman wasn't there. "I'm sorry I could not fulfill your request to pull it out myself. But why, Elrond, and I have stayed up pondering this, why are you so cold towards Saruman?"

"He is cold towards me as well."

"You do not answer my question."

"And I will not." Gandalf looked at Elrond in question. "I cannot," the elf added. Then, finally, "I do not know yet. I cannot place my worry. I know not where it comes from."

"What _do _you know, friend?"

"I know that I am afraid for the White Council under Saruman's leadership," he sighed. "He sires much dissent amongst us." Gandalf raised his eyebrows, the words ringing familiar. The elf looked as if he would continue but instead bit back his words and let out a breath that shook, fatigue weighing his eyelids closed.

Surely dissent amongst the White Council was not the cause of the fear Gandalf had seen in Elrond's eyes when Saruman had prepared to remove the arrow. Something else was going on. Perhaps they would yet visit Lórien after recovering in Isengard, and there he would observe the interactions between the other members, and Elrond, and Saruman. Perhaps something would come to light. Perhaps it would become evident that Elrond and Saruman were, despite their sagacity, as likely to want to mix as water and fire, and their rift was nothing more than a natural repulsion, which, though rarer than most would believe, did occur now and again.

He let out a quiet guffaw. _Wise_. Such words they used for one another. Would that Elrond could spend the rest of his days in bliss under the safe canopy of Imladris with his wife and children. Would that Celeborn and Galadriel could lay under the great Mellyrn trees of Lórien and dream unbroken with the stars for the rest of ages. Would that Gandalf himself could while away his time left in Middle Earth at peace with his pipe-weed, sitting on a mossy stump and noting the white mischief of the hobbit folk and the dappled hides of spring fawns. And Saruman…

And what of Saruman?

* * *

**A/N:** LE END. We promises that the next one-shot will be considerably shorter.

Blooper for 'Heavy':

_Not long after Bezhég has made his leave of the medical tent…_

Gandalf: "You do not answer my question."

Elrond: "And I will not… I cannot… I do not know yet. I cannot place my worry. I know not where it comes from."

Gandalf: "What _do _you know, friend?"

Elrond: "That… *long pause*… pickles are funny."

Gandalf: "…What?"

Elrond: "There is no denying that pickles are inherently funny. Sorry, what are my lines again?"


	2. Foot In Mouth

**A Thing or Two About Elrond**

**2: Foot In Mouth**

_Elrond gets kicked in the face, Crúen the dwarf has bad fashion sense, Elladan fails lore school, Celebrían keeps the conversation interesting, and a jovial time is had by all except Elladan. Family, fluff, wit/word play. Elladan POV. Alcohol and slight drunkenness. _

* * *

_T.A 1978_

_Summer_

"I cannot believe you are allowing this," Elladan grumped. "How long did you say they would – "

"Elladan, my son," said Elrond, "After our guests leave, you may wander into the woods and whine to yourself all you'd like about them but starting right now, you will treat them with the respect and kindness that any guest of Imladris is granted."

Elladan replied with a barely-suppressed sigh. Dwarves. Why should the elves respect dwarves when all any visiting dwarf ever did was smell appalling, eat all their biscuits, break at least one vase, and generally take advantage of their hospitality? Granted, Elladan had only ever seen two dwarves come through, and one had been incredibly old and senile.

But this was _eight_ dwarves. Assuredly this would be a disaster. Elrond said he'd met a few of these dwarves before, some eighty years ago, and had recently invited them to Imladris to 'discuss important matters'. At hearing the news, he'd wondered if Elrond himself wasn't going senile. Elladan had spent much more time of late traveling about than his father had, and had been reminded freshly time and time again that dwarves and elves simply did not get along.

"It draws late; how do you know they haven't become lost?" he asked. Elrond, who was resting his hands on the white stone banister where they waited and watched the path, finally fixed his son with a withering look.

"Náin and Crúen have been here before, remember. Eighty years ago. After we rode out and aided them we invited them back to Imladris to rest a while."

"I remember you telling me that, Ada, but just because a dwarf has been somewhere eighty years prior does not make him a reliable compass."

"Perhaps, my son, if you had been here in Imladris at the time you would have seen that the company of dwarves is not so distasteful as you assume. As I hope you will discover today. I worry that in all your travels you forget to be wary of one of the greatest weaknesses of our race."

"Yes, yes. Pride. One must be ever vigilant. Your lessons are not forgotten."

Elrond raised his eyebrow but said nothing. They turned again to watch the path and in good time could hear a great ruckus of heavy feet and heavy burdens, and then saw eight dwarves making their way up the patch, looking only noticeably road-weary and, Elladan thought, carrying the distinctive odor of old dungeon. Elrond responded to neither the smell nor the look of the company, and stepped out to meet them, Elladan behind.

"Náin son of Durin VI, I am honored to welcome you to Imladris," he said warmly, bowing slightly and putting on what looked to be a genuine smile. "How was your journey?"

Náin, their leader, black of beard and wearing bright silver bands about his wrists and also binding his beard, smiled back.

"Master Elrond, delighted to lay eyes on you once again, and your House. Our journey was well. You remember Crúen here, no doubt. This is Tifuss, Gnok, Bikbar, Bulrin, Hirseg, and Ror."

"Master Crúen," said Elrond, nodding at the red-bearded dwarf. "I remember your face especially well." At this, Crúen smiled, as did, Elladan noticed, all of the other dwarves in the party – the ones Elrond had never met. "I would venture to say that I'd even remember the attire you wore that day. Your every button and pin." Crúen's smile had suddenly fled from his face. Elrond took two slow steps forward as he continued. "I don't seem to recall seeing such a necklace on you last time we met, and yet I feel I have seen it before."

It took Crúen a second to respond, so shocked was he, and in that second Elladan saw what his father had been referring to. The dwarf quickly ferreted it away under his mail and Elrond straightened and smiled.

"Wait, Ada, was that…" Elladan tried, but couldn't spit the words out.

"That was my tooth," Elrond replied plainly, and Crúen colored a deep red. One of the dwarves let out a laugh before slapping his hand over his mouth. Many of the other dwarves were now doing their best not to smile.

"Oh, for the love of Aulë, Crúen, why'd you have to wear that thing?" Náin said, flustered. Like Crúen, he was not smiling. He turned to Elrond. "He parades around with it back in Khazad-dûm like it's a bloody silmaril. Calls it his little trophy. Says he's the only dwarf to own a piece of elf-lord."

"Let us hope that Crúen is the only dwarf whose mind such a thought will ever venture to enter," said Elrond. Elladan could see that his father was mildly amused by the whole thing, which made Elladan's mounting irritation all the more pungent. He remembered the day he noticed his father's rare grin was unbalanced. Elrond said he'd been missing the tooth for years. The gap was behind a canine, and with the number of times Elladan had seen his father really grin, he wasn't surprised he'd never seen it before that point.

"_That's_ where your tooth is?" he finally asked. "You didn't know the dwarf took it?"

"My lot in life was not to keep the whereabouts of my teeth in careful record," Elrond said. "Once they take their leave of my mouth I'm not sure it's my business where they end up." Elladan couldn't believe what he was hearing. He took a step towards the dwarf named Crúen.

"My father welcomed you to rest in Imladris so many years ago, after having saved your reckless hides from orcs. Am I to understand that you – "

"Elladan," Elrond said, laying a hand on his son's shoulder, "calm down. It is a trifle of a thing that you're allowing to vex you."

"It's a necklace, no more," Crúen finally said, having earned back some nerve seeing that Elrond hadn't flown into a fury. "Didn't mean no harm, but besides, your father's right. It's nothing to get knotted around. Who ever heard of an argument being started between warriors over something as simple as a necklace?"

All fell silent and turned to him once again; this time nobody smiled. In fact the dwarves around him seemed to bleach of some color and even the eyes of Elrond betrayed something of distress, if one knew how to look. It was not lost on Elladan.

"Aye," said Náin finally, "never a thing has ever occurred, Crúen. Oh, except the Nauglamír. Only the reason Elves and Dwarves see ill of each other in the first place, you nincompoop," he said, and hit Crúen over the head with his walking pole. Crúen blushed even deeper than before and for a moment the other dwarves looked slightly ill and wouldn't meet the gaze of Elrond (which was still unreadable) or Elladan, who was doing his best not to say something sharp while he waited for his father to do something. As it was the Nauglamír's fault that Elrond and his brother had been orphaned as children, Elladan imagined the issue was liable to do a bit more than cause slight irritation.

"You seem to have put your foot in your mouth, Master Crúen," Elrond finally said. The tension broke like a harpstring and the dwarves laughed, relieved. Náin still looked irritated at his companion's oversight, but did manage a stony smile. "A fair price for my tooth. Let us not tarry here further, my road-weary guests. My son Elladan will show you your places for rest. We will break bread in three hours, if it pleases you."

"I'd say it does, Lord Elrond," responded Náin, "Especially if by 'bread' you mean those biscuits we had last time we were here. Haven't had a thing as good since." Elrond bowed and led them into Imladris, and behind them Elladan could hear Náin continue: "Crúen, I suppose you might not be hungry though. After your meal of foot and all."

**-)O(-**

Grudgingly, Elladan led the dwarves to the guest rooms, all the while doing his best to look serene and gracious, or at least trying not to show his mortification at Crúen's double breach in tact. His father had been, as usual, right. Elladan's temper had been inappropriate. He knew that almost any other elf in Arda would have done more than loose their temper at such actions and comments, but Elladan was the son of Lord Elrond, who saw such things as water under the bridge and reserved his formidable temper for when it really mattered. Sometimes Elladan was deeply thankful that he had Elrond as a role model, but then again, sometimes living up to his father was mighty difficult. Sometimes Elladan felt as if he had double the temper to deal with due to Elrond's encouragement that he always 'hold his temper'. Only sometimes.

"Here," he said finally, coming to an ornately carved oaken door, and pushing it open. On the other side was a tall hallway, guest rooms running its length. "Tifuss," he said, gesturing that the first dwarf in the line should take the first room. "And Gnok," he said at the next door. "Hirseg. Ror. Bikbar." Crúen was next in line and Elladan noted with some satisfaction that the dwarf would not meet his eyes when he was shown into his room. "Bulrin," he said to the second-to-last dwarf. "And finally, Master Náin, here are your quarters. I hope you will find them acceptable."

"Well," said Náin, peering in, "These aren't the same rooms we were in last time, but I don't think we could find anything to complain about if we tried. Well, Ror probably could, but you must disregard everything that great galoot says."

"If you find him so offensive, why do you ask him to journey with you?"

"Offensive he may be, but a right handy tracker. And indispensable when you expect to get lost. He memorizes whole maps before taking off on any sort of journey."

"Ah." Elladan followed Náin as the dwarf wandered to the end of the hallway and peered around the corner instead of settling into his room like the others.

"I see your memory is nothing to sniff at either, Little Master," Náin said. "You rattled off my company's names like you've known them your whole life." Náin saw that around the corner was a porch with a charming view of gardens and running water, and went to lean on the railing.

"When one's father is a lore-master," said Elladan, a little miffed at the title 'little master', "one's memory is expected to be particularly hale in cases of remembering exiguous minutia." He took a place next to the dwarf, surveying the shadows of the approaching eventide.

Náin nodded in understanding, looking slightly lost, and Elladan wondered if he shouldn't have used such polysyllabic words.

"You listen to your dad's stories a lot then?" asked Náin.

"I can hardly make him stop telling them," he replied with a laugh. All at once Elladan realized he was enjoying a dwarf's company, which caught him quite off-guard. Of all the things he had expected the dwarves' visit to bring, agreeable company was not one of them.

"He ever tell you how he and I first met?"

"Small details only. My brother and I spend much time traveling. We were away during the time you first visited Imladris, and we did not return until a year and a half after that."

"Ah. Haha. Well I can't tell a story like a lore-master, but I _can_ tell a story like the grimy little mountain muffin that I am! Let's see, it was 1900. 78 years ago. Your dad and the wizard Gandalf had just sent a request to my lord Durin VI 'requesting and warning' that they stop digging down into the mountain, for fear of something or another, not relevant to the story. Anyways, my father thought that was nonsense but sent me and a party of dwarves north to look for another site for a mithril mine, just to cover our bases. So it was me and Crúen and a few others..." Náin paused and shuffled about in one of the bags that hung at his waist, and drew out a pipe, and a bag of herbs.

"Of course, having spent so long down in Khazad-dûm, we weren't privy to the fact that the mountains up there were crawling with orcs." Pausing, Náin packed his pipe and lit it by the flame of one of the lanterns on the porch. After a moment of drawing air through the smoldering weed, he sighed, sending a gust of smoke to the breeze (thankfully Náin was downwind of Elladan), and continued.

"Well apparently there was an elf sentry from Rivendell that saw us coming… Quite a ways from Rivendell to have been posted, if you ask me, not that I'm ungrateful. Now that scout, he rode back to Rivendell and sounded the alarm or blew the horn or what have you. Of course, Lord Elrond must have thought us a right daft bunch of wanderers to be waltzing into orc territory, and lo, not a day south of the High Pass we were set upon by a flock of orcs! Biggest orcs I've ever seen!"

At this, Náin laughed and puffed merrily. Elladan watched the dwarf's eyes wrinkle as he settled into the memory.

"Vastly outnumbered, we were. We took a good number of them down, but they were still seepin' out of the woods like… well, I don't need to say what it was like in such company, Little Lord, but it was nothing if not disheartening, to be so far from home and food and at night, too. I was just about to have a face-off with the biggest, fattest, meanest, smelliest, troll-face orc I'd ever seen when right before my eyes he stops in mid-roar with an arrow stickin' through his throat. Falls over, neat as you please. And there behind him I see these three shadows come riding out of the mist and the night – did I forget to tell you, it was bloody foggy to boot – and at first I thought, lovely, mounted orcs, but then I heard that they weren't making monstrous noises and they weren't dressed in oily rags and obviously their faces didn't look like they'd been sewn together by a blind blacksmith who's got no thumbs.

"I guess at the time there wasn't a host of fighting elves in Rivendell, but let me tell you, your dad and those other two were a force to reckon with all the same, I'm not ashamed to admit. Did a right number on those orcs, they did. Well, we were all pretty occupied with fighting but I remember seeing your dad off his horse – don't know how that happened – taking down an orc that was about to get the better of little Gúfen. I didn't see it straight but I think another of the brutes came along and just – _pow! – _kicked him in the face. Then _Gúfen_ cut _that _orc's leg off at the knee and took it from there.

"It was all over so quickly once those three elves arrived. Couple of us had some cuts and scrapes and bites and Crúen was sort of being the medic on the trip, unqualified as he is. Well I was limping up to Gúfen, who looked a little addled, and I saw Crúen go up to your dad – he was unconscious, or looked it from my angle – and take a gander at his mouth, which was bloody, and then he reaches in and picks something out of there and stuffs it in his shirt pocket. Then Lord Elrond comes 'round and Crúen says, _Good to see the whites of your eyes, Master Elf. You took a blow to the head, here's a rag and some water, _and he hands him the rag and the water and tells him that he'd taken the liberty of removing a dislocated tooth while he was senseless , so as to save him the pain upon waking."

Náin snorted, sending smoke out his nostrils.

"Your dad brought us back to Rivendell to clean up and get some proper food. Mighty nice host he is, your dad. Lord Elrond," Náin added, as if correcting himself. The dwarf puffed thoughtfully for a few moments. "And Crúen waits 'til we're back at Khazad-dûm to string it up and tie it 'round his neck and strut about. I think Durin just about had a fit, but everyone else thought it was a riot!" He finished with a laugh, and then looked up at Elladan. "Come on, it's funny. Crúen never meant any real harm. He may seem low but he's just an airhead, is all. Come, even your dad thought it was funny."

"Something of the situation is funny, though we may not agree on which parts," Elladan finally replied, allowing a smile. "You tell stories very differently from my Lord Elrond, Master Náin, and what a pleasure it was. You have a gift."

"Psshht. I've got a flapping gobber and nothing else. Look, the sun is down already. I've taken up the evening jabbering. I usually save that for dinner."

"No doubt you'll have due time soon enough."

"Well, I'd best clean up. A right git I'd look coming to a meal like this. I'll see you there, Little Master."

Elladan listened to the dwarf's heavy footsteps go back to the hallway of their rooms, and then the shutting of the door.

"Little Master," Elladan grunted, and made his way down to the kitchens. He found that he didn't mind the name so much after all.

**-)O(-**

"Wait, you're actually making them biscuits?"

"They asked for them, did they not?" Elrond replied, dropping a clod of dough down onto a rolling stone and wedging it. "In truth, I would do almost anything to put their minds and bodies in pleasant straits. Otherwise I do not believe they will be open to my request tomorrow morning."

"You think making them biscuits will persuade them to stop mining in Khazad-dûm?" Elladan asked incredulously.

"No…" Elrond replied, racking the dough with the rolling pin, "but it _may _add to the chance that they will at least hear me, maybe consider. Fetch a cask of mead from the cellar, would you?"

"Bringing out the mead? You _are _serious about this Khazad-dûm threat, aren't you?"

"Son, we bring mead out for any visitors we host. And yes, I am quite serious about Khazad-dûm."

"If biscuits are such an important part of policy and strategy, I think I should be learning how to make them, not fetching casks of mead."

"Biscuits," Elrond started, cutting the sheet of dough into a grid of triangles, "are much like healing. What are the necessities of a good healer?"

"Skill, power, art, and lore."

"Right. It takes skill, power, art… not so much lore… to make a good biscuit. I have no doubt you have the skill and no doubt you have the power, but in the art is where the key to a good biscuit lies. Practice makes perfect and unfortunately we have half an hour before dinner is set, which leaves no time for you to practice today. Perhaps if you'd come down and helped after showing the dwarves to their quarters… where _did _you wander off to, anyway?" he asked, flipping the triangles of dough onto baking stones.

"Master Náin told me the story of how he first met you."

"Oh?" asked Elrond, raising an eyebrow. "And what did you learn?"

"To be wary of confusing thoughtlessness with malice, I suppose." Elrond shot his son a smile as he carried the stones to the kiln oven.

"What art you lack in baking you more than make up for in observing the stories and memories of others, my son. You have long proven that." Elrond shifted the kiln oven's door into position. "Now please, go fetch the mead before your naneth has a conniption."

"Who's having a conniption?" Elladan heard Celebrían ask as he headed towards the cellar. Of anybody in Imladris, Elladan was sure that his mother was the _least _likely to have a fit over a dinner, likely because she invariably had the situation under control. In fact Elladan was sure that if Elrond would bring Celebrían to the meeting tomorrow about Khazad-dûm, the dwarves must surely do as Elrond wished and stop their mining. Galadriel had told them that Celebrían could talk a boulder into getting up and flying, and if that were possible, surely Celebrían could talk a dwarf into putting down his pick-axe.

Despite the rush, all was set when the proper time came. They had the spread set out near the gardens, as the air was gentle and still and the stars were blinking through the leaves. Tall torches lit the rich tablecloth and the passing crick. As a kitchen aid set the last steaming dish down upon the table, the dwarves appeared near the stairs, eight dark lumps on the move and making appreciative noises.

"What a pleasure, Master Elrond. Who have we to thank for this hospitality?" asked Náin, who did indeed look much better.

"Many hands have come together to gift us here," responded Elrond, and then looked to the kitchen, from where Celebrían was returning with a stack of hand linens. "But in our kitchen many hands are ever futile without a manager. This is Celebrían," Elrond said, and drew her into a brief side-hug, "my wife." Elladan imagined he saw a tiny glint in his father's eye that dared anyone to do anything vulgar in front of his significant other. "Master Náin, I do not believe you two have met. She was away in Lórien with our daughter Arwen when you first visited."

"Aye," said Náin, clearly a little starstruck, "I think I would have remembered your face, my lady." He came forward and kissed her hand, and the other dwarves bowed their heads to her, equally dazed. Elladan had heard people say that Galadriel was the fairest elf of Middle Earth, but those that met his mother were sometimes quick to change their minds.

Elrond sat at the head of the table, Celebrían to one side and Náin to the other. Next to Náin sat Ror, and next to him would sit Elladan, and the rest of the table was a fair mixing of elf and dwarf. Elladan picked up the cask of mead he'd brought up from the cellar and had poured some for his parents, Náin, and Ror. Before he could move on, Ror sniffed the mead, took a sip, and then a shifty look stole into his features.

"Say," he started, "I heard from a ranger who heard from some elf from here that you were brewing something called _abyss juice_."

The dwarves, who had all begun to chat to their neighbors, fell silent and looked at Elrond. Elrond, in turn, pointed his gaze at Elladan.

"It wasn't me," said his son. "Elrohir must have told someone."

The looks on the faces of the dwarves intensified. Elladan was sure they were feeling torn between proving themselves to be decent fellows in front of the Lady of Imladris and answering to their dwarvish nature, which Elladan had heard had an insatiable desire for adventure when it came to brews.

"Well," said his father, finally, "yes, as a matter of fact, we've been experimenting with multiple distillations. We call it _iâpeich_, though, gracious, not _abyss juice_. I must warn you, it's quite strong."

This only elicited a cheer from the dwarves, whose curiosity had far gotten the better of them. Elrond sent for the iâpeich, and shortly and with no further circumstance, the meal was started. Elladan, who had watched his father methodically work with the iâpeich for some time, would not deny his curiosity. He downed his mead (the dwarves watched, bewildered) so that when the new cask came around he could try some.

"That's the spirit, there!" grumbled Ror. "We'll loosen you up a bit yet."

"I assure you, Master Ror," responded Elladan, "that after almost 2,000 years of practice behind me, I have no expectations of going on a spree tonight."

"1,848 years, Elladan," said Celebrían. "You've 151 years before 2,000. Much can happen in 151 years."

"What are you implying, naneth?"

"Just a word of warning," she said teasingly. Elladan repressed a blush. His own mother doubting his abilities. The brew had come to the table now, and Elrond and Celebrían passed, handing the cask directly to Náin. The dwarves had followed Elladan's lead and emptied their goblets to make room, and now they merrily refilled with the amber liquor. Ror was happy to pour Elladan's drink, and Elladan saw with interest that Elrond seemed a trifle horrified at how full his vessel was filled.

_Elladan,_ spoke Elrond to his son's mind, _your naneth is right. You may have decades of experience over the dwarves but you are not used to this._

_It's merely a sip,_ responded Elladan. _You keep saying I can try it._

_ I meant for you to sample it, not quaff it with our guests._

_ You lack faith in me? Do I not have your blood in my veins?_ he asked, and picked up the goblet.

_My blood in your veins makes no difference if –_

"Welzig's white whiskers, this is _good!_" exclaimed Bikbur, who was met with a chorus of agreement. Elrond looked from the dwarves to his son to his quietly smiling wife and seemed to give up the battle. He raised his own goblet of mead and toasted silently to his son in a not entirely unkind manner. Elladan smirked and took a sip of the iâpeich, and then swallowed what felt like a small flaming hedgehog. Nobody seemed to notice the look on his face, for which he was grateful.

And so it was that all of the family and guests passed the meal pleasantly and in good company. For a while Elladan listened to Celebrían tell an attentive Náin about Arwen, and about Elrohir (who had opted out of hosting eight dwarves in favor of embarking on another adventure with the Rangers), and about how she had watched the mountains change over time. Soon he lost interest, possibly because it was getting harder to hear over the buzz of the other conversations going on around the table. At one point Ror kindly refilled his drink for him; Elladan noted the dwarves themselves had passed on a second round. Looking back, this should have aroused his suspicion, but at the time, Elladan saw it as a sign that the dwarves had realized that Elladan was, at least, going to hold out, and was not, no indeed, going to go on a spree.

_I see that,_ Elrond's voice came, as if from the end of a particularly echo-y hallway. _Son, if you drink that –_

Elladan quaffed it.

_Very well,_ Elrond said. _Please don't say anything stupid._

"Like what?" Elladan asked aloud.

"Hmm?" asked Ror.

"What would be stupid?" he asked, not quite sure what he meant by that.

"I didn't say anything stupid," said Ror.

"Oh, but are you sure?" he asked, realizing where he'd been going.

"Quite, yes, Master Elladan."

"Then… where is Crúen?"

"Right across and to the side, there."

"Ah. Yes. Crúen, I believe _you _may have said something borderline stupid this morning." Yes, yes he had, hadn't he? What was it the dwarf had said? Something about a necklace? Ah, that was it – the Nauglamír. He had forgotten the most important detail of the history of his race.

_Elladan, please stop talking,_ said Elrond.

"I hope you feel at least some remorse, Master Crúen, for what you said." Crúen, for his part, who had been interrupted with a conversation with another elf, looked all at once amused and horrified. "Why, forgetting your own history… _our _own history? I can tell you right now, we elves _never _forget." He felt Elrond leave his mind then, and could almost hear one of his father's eyebrows crawling up to his hairline, but he didn't mind. He was telling this dwarf what he needed to hear. Some things just had to be said.

"Elvish ancestry is very rich. Much more so than any other ancestry of any other people of Arda. And that's partly because everything is so meticulously recorded and kept safe, and then studied very hard. If everyone did that, I very much doubt that so many mistakes would be made. Everyone would always learn from their past. We have a great amount of wisdom to dip into."

Now a few of the nearby dwarves and elves were listening in on his montage with interest. Good. The more the merrier.

"Now, if I were you, I would listen carefully if an elf ever tried to give you advice. For instance, anything about Khazad-dûm, just for example, I mean, if anybody were to give advice about that particular situation, perhaps said advice should be heeded. Historically, it is very clear in the records that anyone who is given advice by an elf would do best to listen. You never hear of anybody giving elves advice, do you? This stands to show the high quality of the advice of elves."

"My son," said Elrond finally, in a voice that turned everyone's heads. By the time Elladan had finished speaking, he'd had everyone's attention already, but the elf lord easily snatched it away. Celebrían hid her mouth with her hand, behind which Elladan could see a poorly-concealed smile. "You are the son of a lore-master, are you not?"

"Of course."

"Then how is it that your memory fails to vex you with the knowledge that your great-great grandfather, the elf Turgon, did not heed your great grandfather, the man Tuor's, advice, and so doomed his kingdom to fall at the hands of orcs?"

In the prevailing silence, Elladan's mind spun and caught as he remembered. He opened his mouth to protest but found that no words would come. There was nothing to say.

"I believe," Elrond continued, and passed one of the dishes his way, "that you have not yet tried the foot-in-mouth casserole. I think you would like it very much."

The roar of laughter following the comment almost made Elladan want to clap his hands over his burning ears, but his joints were rather paralyzed. Had he really forgotten that? Had he really said that? Yes and yes. _Valir preserve me_, he sighed, and tried to bring his mind back to an appropriate level of awareness, as he now saw how far down it had slumped. He glowered at his father for having made a fool of him, but his father had already engaged in another conversation, for which Elladan was strangely thankful – more attention away from him. He fought the urge to place his face in his hands. Or better yet jump into a cold spring.

Elladan played his conversations lightly and quietly after that, listening more than he spoke, though he was having considerable trouble focusing. Ror thought it all quiet humorous, and tried to push more iâpeich on Elladan, who refused, and Ror laughed.

It took a moment after that for Elladan's ears to finally pick up what his parents and Náin were talking about; their conversation had turned again to the night back in 1900 when Elrond and two of his blade-worthy friends had ridden to save the dwarves. They laughed about how Gúfen had been able to move infinitely faster using one leg and one crutch than he had with just his two feet before. They remembered how blasted foggy it had been, and how the moisture had stuck to their clothing and chilled them. Náin described the orc that had kicked Elrond's tooth out to Celebrían, how its fingers seemed like those of a witch, nails long and green, and its wild, oily locks of hair.

"Lady Celebrían," said Náin finally, after realizing that the description of a terrifying orc was not about to bring the same thrills to an elf lady than it might to a dwarf warrior, "I do feel sorry that we brought you trouble in the first place. I know you weren't there but if we hadn't been tramping around in the mountains, attracting all the orcs in the nearby passes, your husbands' mug would never have been marred."

"Marred?" she said, and turned to Crúen, down the table, who had been listening with a handful of other dwarves. "Master Crúen, you have my thanks for getting rid of the tooth when you did."

"I… I do?"

"Well of course. It is less a scar than a verification to me. How else am I supposed to know that the elf I'm kissing under cover of darkness is my husband?"

Elladan's blush returned full-force. The dwarves, however, thought this was hysterical, and laughed loudly and buoyantly. Ror slapped him on the back and pounded the table, and Elladan, still astounded that his mother would say such a thing, was even more astounded to see that his father was actually smirking.

**-)O(-**

The night ended merrily; dwarves and elves parted as friends, bidding each other goodnight, with the expectation to meet again in the morning under more serious conditions. No biscuits were left, though Elrond had made many extra. Elladan could have sworn that his face was still warm from drink and shame and embarrassment, which was altogether a foreign experience to him – at least, he hadn't felt this way since he was much younger.

His father had wandered down a garden path and Elladan knew he would spend many hours of the night standing on the bridge above the stream, contemplating. On a different night, under different circumstances, Elladan might have even joined him for a few hours, to watch the reflection of the stars in the water. But this night he had only one goal, and that was to somehow redeem himself. He'd made a proper fool of himself and he was sure Elrond was disappointed, puzzled, ashamed, or a combination of the three. His head was pounding behind his eyes and he couldn't think straight, and so didn't know quite what he would say now, but he had to try saying _something. _

The moon was half, and hung in the branches above as Elladan stood at the base of the bridge. Elrond stood with his hands clasped behind his back, head bowed to watch the water pass, dark hair reaching down like another shadow. For a moment Elladan only watched him, not wishing to interrupt whatever thoughts were swirling, but the pain in his head mounted in intensity.

"Ada?"

"Elladan?" said Elrond, and looked down the bridge. Elladan walked to join him.

"I know you will be engaged for much of tomorrow discussing important matters."

"Yes."

"So I wanted to talk to you right now."

"Yes?"

"Well… Are you…" Suddenly he felt like a little elfling again, and his next words he had to force to come out. "Are you mad at me?" He asked his question to the river, and refused to look up to meet his father's gaze.

"Of course not," was the reply.

"Are you ashamed of me?" he asked.

"No, Elladan," was the reply again, this time laced with mirth. Elladan looked up. "I am merely amused at your adventuresome spirit, and also at your ability to prove yourself wrong. Sometimes it is better to prove yourself wrong than wait for someone to do it for you."

Elladan let out a deep sigh and sat down on the bridge, letting his boots hang down above the water. His father paused before crouching next to him.

"What troubles you?"

"Well, a headache, for starters."

"Besides?"

"Why do you always find the silver lining?" he asked, and surprised himself. Yes, that _is _what he'd been meaning to ask, wasn't it? For years now. "I thought the young were supposed to be full of hope and bright-eyed, and the old were supposed to have conservative judgment and a bitter outlook."

"I am _not _that old… And I _do _have my bitter side. You know that." His father settled into a kneel at his side, and watched the spruce tops wave for a moment. "I can't always find the silver lining, Elladan. Sometimes there are simply too many clouds to trace."

"You're the only elf I know that would not be bothered by the fact that a dwarf _forgot_ about the Nauglamír," he said, exasperated.

"That does bother me, Elladan," replied Elrond. "It bothers me deeply. But it does not enrage me. That would do no good. Anger rarely does."

"Yes, but Ada…." Elladan tried again, still struggling for control over all of his words and thoughts, "The danger you have foreseen in Khazad-dûm is grim. It would affect us all. Any elf of old in their right mind surely would have sought to destroy such enemies whose actions could result in such abominations. Not made them biscuits."

"Let me put this into words that might make sense to you in your present state, Elladan: the moment you hand a fresh biscuit to your enemy, your newest friend takes it, for you have destroyed your enemy."

"But… what if they won't agree to stop mining?"

"If we part on good terms despite that, we still will have destroyed our enemies."

"With biscuits shall we destroy our enemies. Who knew."

"You need to rest," said Elrond decisively, standing up and taking Elladan's hand to haul him upright as well. Once Elladan was on his feet, Elrond opened a pocket in his robe and drew out a small pouch. "I put this together for you before I came out here. I knew you'd follow."

"What is it?" he asked, taking it.

"Some herbs. Trust me."

"What are they for?"

"If you don't take them, in the morning your head will feel like an orc's been dancing on it. I'd let you find out the hard way but I think you've had enough embarrassment for the time being." With that, Elrond shooed him down the bridge back towards the buildings, and Elladan headed for his quarters. On the way he sorted through his thoughts (which were currently vague and elusive) looking for the silver lining to his current situation. As he passed by the hall of the dwarves' chambers and heard their raucous snoring, he smiled a little, and realized that once again Elrond's words had come true. Elladan had found that the company of dwarves was not always so distasteful. Even Crúen had forgiven him his verbal assault at dinner, possibly because of how amusing it must have been to see the son of an elf lord addled by drink. In the morning he figured all would be wary of what they said, owing to the slip-ups of both races the night before. Not that he would know. He figured he would be making himself scarce for much of the next day; meditating off the headache (which hadn't yet subsided), and learning how to make biscuits.

* * *

**A/N:** Thanks for reading, you lovely person you. My sincerest hope is that you smiled once in the past few minutes. Next oneshot: Elrond and the customs and traditions of Man.


	3. Post Scriptum

**3: Post Scriptum**

_This story exploded into precisely what I hadn't meant to write upon starting it. (Sound familiar?) This is a simple tale: Elrond helps a young boy, and is given a letter. Tragedy plus warm fuzzy feelings near the end. _

* * *

_TA 37_

_December 17_

First came the noises on the night wind: horse hooves pounding the duff and shattering the ice skins of dormant ponds; and the riders, their furious choir of howls and bellows urging their mounts on through the trees of the Weather Hills. They were a fair distance off yet but the riders were coming his direction and sounded quite angry and Elrond was on foot. Most of the trees around were bare and would have afforded no cover; by the time he made it to a grove of pines and had swung himself up into its branches, the wind carried the stink of hill-men, and smoke and something foul burning.

The oncoming riders were spreading out. Branches started to glow as their torchlights came closer. They were searching the woods for something, or someone. Elrond didn't think they would see him even if they chanced to look into the pine, but all the same he began to regret that he'd chosen to leave the horse in Fornost to take the shortcut on foot through the Weather Hills, back to Imladris. Apparently the roads would have been safer this night.

He had only a moment to begin to wonder what was being searched for when he realized something was plunging through the brush of a streambed very close to him – it sounded like a small person, from their frantic gait. The elf heard another on foot, gaining rapidly on the first person, heavier and faster. A small, flailing form fell from the brush and into the moonshadow of the tree in which Elrond crouched, picked itself up, and stumbled forward, but the chaser erupted from the night behind it and lunged, catching at the arm of its prey, and finally falling heavy atop it.

The 'it' was a boy of seven or eight, clad in ill-fitting travel clothes, and the chaser was a trollish man wearing many furs, his unkempt beard failing to hide a wild, horrible grin, which spoke silently of past and future misdeeds.

"Here!" the man yelled, "Here, over here! I've got the boy! Quickly!"

Some riders over the hill heard the cry and Elrond heard them wheel their mounts in their direction. The man, still grinning and fighting to catch his breath, knelt over the back of the struggling boy and held the boy's arm at a wretched angle. The boy began to sob frantically.

"Gotcha," the man snarled.

Elrond had dropped from the tree before his thoughts had the chance to catch up with his actions. His feet hit the ground and he drew out his hunting dagger and he knew he had to act quickly, as a hunting dagger, even wielded by an elf, was no match for a host of mounted, armed men.

The man, whose eyes Elrond guessed were not so sharp in the night, saw that something had fallen from the tree but couldn't track the elf's quick movements, and three heartbeats later Elrond was behind him, one gloved hand wrenching the man's head back by the hair and the other one pressing his dagger into the man's neck.

"Let the boy go."

"Who in the name of – "

Elrond hauled the man backwards, cutting off his words. The riders were approaching and Elrond was not about to tarry. He pulled the man upright, flipped the dagger, caught it by the blade, and gave a sharp whack of the hilt to the back of the man's head. He fell limp at Elrond's feet.

This had taken only seconds but the boy had already scrabbled to his feet, fallen over, backed away in fear, and spun around to run away. Elrond could see that something was hurting him in his foot or leg. The elf sheathed his dagger, took three steps, and caught the boy's uninjured arm.

"I will hide you, come this way – "

"Let me _go!_" the boy hissed, wrenching his arm to get away, but the elf's grip was strong. Elrond crouched down and tried to catch the boy's eyes.

"You must trust me. The riders are near, we must move. Come." He stood, but still the boy tried to twist away. Hoof beats rang in Elrond's ears now, and the torchlight was growing brighter. Seeing no other choice but feeling terrible all the same, he wrapped an arm around the boy's chest and hauled him kicking and stumbling past the pine tree and then into the deeper woods of a valley. Enraged bellows erupted behind them as the riders reached the unconscious man and Elrond chanced a look behind. The torchlight was still much too near for comfort and the boy still kicked and cried.

Elrond brought them to an upturned root system and knelt, bringing the boy to his knees beside him and placing his hands firmly on the boy's shoulders. The boy struggled weakly to dislodge him.

"Hush now! Hush. We're safe but we must be very still and quiet." The boy, whose dark eyes had grown large and shiny as coins, finally met Elrond's gaze, and stopped struggling. His breath came hitched but he covered his mouth with his hands – a nice gesture, if useless. Elrond turned from him and peered between the roots of the tree. The men stalked the area under the pine restlessly, shouting.

"Are you an elf?" whispered the boy.

"Hush," Elrond responded. The men were beginning to fan out. They would be found if they did not move again. Elrond came to his feet and took the boy's hand, and this time the boy came willingly, for which Elrond was grateful as they navigated over and through fallen trees, moving as quickly as the limping boy could manage. Climbing a tree would have been difficult and risky with the boy's injuries, and Elrond doubted the men would leave the woods until they found him.

"Where's my family?" the boy whispered tearfully, voice harsh from running. Elrond felt a pang in his chest. Family? He paused, and the boy watched him listen closely to the night. There were several groups of mounted men in the woods surrounding them now, quite spread out. Far off he heard what sounded like another pursuit, maybe two.

"What would these men do if they caught your family?" Elrond asked.

"I don't know!" the boy sobbed. "They said we saw something bad and they thought we'd tell and they started chasing us!"

Straining his ears, the elf heard triumphant shouts erupt from one of the chasing parties, and a woman's yell and sobbing. More men had shown up under the pine tree, and a line of torchlight was fast approaching. Another group of men scoured the far side of the valley, coming towards them. The boy clung to Elrond's hand, shaking, peering into the darkness. Elrond knew it was insanity to attempt to save the other family members from a certainly unpleasant fate, but he also knew it would vex his conscious for eternity if he didn't try.

"Quickly," he said to the boy, and they followed the contour of the valley, heading towards where the woman's voice had come from. So many noises were now coming at him, angry shouting and distressed screams, horses on the move and branches breaking, that he was having trouble keeping track of where everyone was. The boy fell to the ground, hands to his knee, and Elrond considered ferreting him away somewhere unseen while he went to do what he could for the others but he did not trust that the many moving parts of the situation would leave the boy alone. He hefted the boy into the air and over his shoulder, a position he knew was none too comfortable, but there was hardly a choice.

The voice of the woman came more plainly to his ears now, and he cringed at her noises as he picked his way through the brush. He could barely see the torchlight that gave away where she was being held – still too far, too far away.

"See, we have your daughter and husband, wench," scowled a rough voice. "Where's the boy?"

The woman could only sob and plead that they be left alone.

"Tell us where the boy is and we'll let your daughter go."

"Don't touch her!" the woman managed through her tears. "Don't you lay a finger on her!"

"Tell us where the boy is."

"Leave us alone! Please! We didn't see anything! We won't tell anyone!"

"Lying tramp."

"I don't know where he is. Don't… please don't touch my daughter."

"Call out to him then."

Elrond knew the boy couldn't yet hear what was being said, but soon they'd be close enough, and he hoped the boy wouldn't do anything rash. The elf had just skirted a jumble of boulders when to his horror a line of fire came up over the ridge to their right. The horsemen had organized into a line out of view, and now rode through the woods, from far ahead of them and continuing back behind him for a long ways.

He looked to his left, down the valley and across it. Another line of men was making their way down the bank, moving parallel to the frozen stream.

Elrond stopped. The line to their right would without a doubt find them. The mounted riders were moving too fast for an elf carrying a boy to avoid.

"Rawden!" cried the mother. "Run, son! Run!" Her voice ripped the night air as savagely as birthing cries, and then Elrond heard a blow dealt.

"Mom?" asked the tearful boy Rawden. "Do you see my mom ahead?"

"Hush," Elrond said again, a terrible knot forming in his chest. They were simply too far away. They might be able to reach the mother's voice but the line would hit them before he could do anything. The idea of fighting through any of them would be most unwise – the rest of the men no doubt would converge on him rapidly. And the probability of him being able to get a boy, a girl, a husband and wife out of the woods and away from this many mounts was absurd.

The line approached from the right.

"No!" cried the woman, voice now frayed. "No!" Elrond tried not to imagine to what she was protesting, but whatever it was, it continued.

"Mom! My mom's over there," said Rawden, now struggling to get down. Elrond knew he'd paused here too long. The mounts would be on them in moments. He searched around for a wrinkle in the ground, a crevice, a gap that would fit them, and spotted an erosion scar where vernal springs no doubt carried the bank silt down to the stream. Rawden slid off his shoulder of his own accord and before the boy could go in pursuit of his mother Elrond drew them both down into the icy cleft and threw his travel cloak over them, and hoped it looked inconspicuous. Realizing that subtlety would not prevent them from being mashed by hooves, he shifted his body over Rawden's. Better to be crushed by an elf than a horse.

Rawden's mother continued to scream, and now if Elrond listened closely through the cloak and the near sounds of hooves, he heard other tormented shouts – one no doubt was Rawden's sister, and weak protests that must have been his father.

Elrond clapped his gloved hands over Rawden's ears. Rawden scrabbled for a moment to remove them but soon they found handfuls of Elrond's tunic front and hung on to that instead. The boy's chest hitched as he tried to hold in sobs.

The horses were upon them; Elrond could see the glow of their torches lighting up the cloak. He grit his teeth against the horrible screams of the poor family, and in anticipation of a hoof punching into his back. One beast's hoof sunk into their ditch and the horse stumbled, but the rider urged it on and in the passing of one held breath, the line was over them and crashing its way down the bank. Elrond held still. It would be far too easy to be seen if they got up and ran right now.

He kept his hands over the boy's ears. The woman was still screaming and his heart ached to know that something atrocious and probably irreversible was taking place just over the next hill. In a minute the father's voice was silenced, followed soon by the mother's, which had near the end been altered into a keening so sharp and thin Elrond was sure Rawden must be able to hear it. The last voice to die was that of the daughter's, a low, delirious wail that echoed in the chambers of his heart long after it had been cut short.

A moment of silence followed, and then the sound of bodies being shifted. The horses that had scoured the area were across the valley and up over the next hill, their noises fading. Elrond could hear quite clearly what was going on not far from them.

"What about the boy?" someone finally asked.

"If the men don't find him he'll die of exposure. He's lost, scared, won't find his way back anywhere. 'Sides, who would believe an orphan boy?"

"Hunh," someone grunted in agreement.

"Get the bodies up, let's get out of here. We've still got a fire going back at the gathering place." They were taking the bodies with them, draping them onto horses. Abruptly the breeze filled their cleft in the ground with the metal stench of fresh blood.

Elrond took his hands from Rawden's head and felt a weight shift onto his conscience – he was now responsible for the boy.

"Where's my – "

"Shh," Elrond said, putting a hand over his mouth. They listened as the horses and their riders made haste through the woods, in the path of the horsemen searching with torches. Elrond waited before no torchlight was hitting the top of the cloak and he could no longer count the hoof-beats before throwing off the cloak and helping the boy to his feet.

"My apologies for crushing you," Elrond whispered, desperately hoping Rawden wouldn't insist on going to his mother.

"You're not very heavy," Rawden replied gamely, though his voice was still wavering.

"Can you walk?"

"My ankle hurts a lot. It feels like it's burning."

"Climb on my back, then. We'll leave the area," Elrond said quietly, kneeling. The boy, obviously used to getting rides from tall people, clambered into position and Elrond stood back up.

"But we need to find my mom and dad and sister first," said Rawden, and Elrond consciously suppressed a shudder. He would have to be the one to tell Rawden. He alone knew that Rawden's family was gone forever – besides the vile hill men that had committed the atrocity.

"Rawden, those men are still searching for you," Elrond said, striking off into the woods at a rapid walk. "Your safety is the most important thing right now." He didn't know how he would break the news, but he was sure he didn't have it in himself to do it right now. Perhaps, he thought, the boy already knew, and was just refusing to acknowledge it.

"The mean men are behind us," the boy replied. "I think they're gone. I think my mom is over that hill though."

"Your mother told you to run. Those men will be back. Let us listen to what she said."

"My dad makes a lot more noise when he's carrying me through the woods. You're being quiet."

"That's because I am an elf."

"I know. You're tall and you've got pointy ears."

Elrond was glad the boy could see his ears and not his face at that point, for he felt none too composed. His heart was heavier in his chest than the boy was on his shoulders, and the boy was a sudden weight indeed, in more than the physical sense. He asked Rawden what it was that his family had seen and Rawden's description made it sound like a gathering of men had been practicing sorcery – complete with a sacrifice. It was regrettable, to say the least, to hear that this soon after Sauron's fall there were people in Middle Earth that would support another rise of darkness.

"Where are we going?" Rawden asked.

"Amon Sûl," replied Elrond. "Weathertop."

"Why? That's the wrong way."

"Wrong way to get where?"

"To my uncle's place. That's where we were going."

_For the love of Ulmo,_ thought Elrond. How involved into Rawden's life was he going to get?

"Where does your uncle live, Rawden?"

"I don't really know. But my dad knows."

Elrond suppressed a sigh.

"Rawden," he began, "where you want to go and where your family is going are now different places."

"But they were going to my Uncle's house too."

Elrond didn't respond. Far as they'd gone from where the horsemen were, he still didn't feel entirely safe, and he couldn't predict how Rawden would react to the facts of the situation. He'd have to try something else.

"How about," he said, "you decide where we go. In Amon Sûl there will be warm food, shelter, we can get your arm and ankle taken care of, and tell the guards that there are dangerous hill men in this area. We can get a horse, too, and then find your uncle's house. Or, we can go on foot right now and try to find your uncle's house." The one positive of the latter situation, that he could see, was that there was a possibility he could pass the boy off, tell the uncle what had happened, and then leave it to him to break the news to the boy.

"I think it would be better to go to… Amen Suu," said the boy thoughtfully, valiantly botching the Sindarin term. "Ahmm… Amen Sul."

"Amon Sûl."

"Amen Sool?"

"Amon. With an _O_. Amon Sûl."

"Amon Sûl."

"Yes."

"Weathertop."

"Yes. I think you've made a wise decision, Rawden."

"Will my family be there?"

"No," Elrond said quickly, before he could think. He might have said 'maybe' or 'I don't know' but that would be cruelty, to kindle false hope. There was a long pause before Rawden spoke again, and Elrond glanced at the sky. The stars had wheeled around since last he'd looked up. It would be getting light soon.

"But you'll stay with me, right?"

"Of course. Until we find your uncle's house," he said, with more conviction than he felt.

"What's your name?"

"My name is Elrond."

"How do you know _my _name?"

"Your mother told me."

For a considerable time then, the boy fell silent. Elrond wondered if they'd ever be able to find Rawden's uncle's house, and if he'd feel obligated to take the boy and raise him himself, and then wondered if Imladris would turn into a foster home for not only the sons of kings but also any child that happened to loose their family or otherwise go unwanted. He shuddered to think that such a place would ever be needed.

"How far to Amon Sûl?" Rawden asked.

"Ten or fifteen miles."

"Do you have any water?"

Elrond had nothing with him besides the dagger and a flint and steel. He had thought to travel quickly from Annúminas to Imladris without pause. They were following a channel, and Elrond assumed that in its depth a small stream slept. After reaching the bottom of the slope and putting Rawden on his own feet, Elrond broke the ice and made a hole near the bank. He crouched and watched the chill water pulsing between Rawden's cupped hands and had the abrupt and nausea-inducing realization that right now, while he was face-to-face with the boy, and wasn't surrounded with the crowd and buzz of Amon Sûl, was the time to speak. In the silence and before he said anything, he thought he could hear Rawden's heartbeats coming faster and his breath kick higher. The boy came to sit near him, upon a smooth river rock.

"Do you… Do you know where my mom and dad are?" Rawden asked. His eyes looked glazed as they stared into Elrond's, and by the signals the elf was getting, Rawden understood that he was not about to hear the answer he hoped for. Elrond, for his part, could not respond, as he tried to compose the proper way to say what he needed to say. He could see that his hesitation was overwhelming the boy with trepidation, so he gave up and spoke the unrefined truth.

"Your parents and sister are dead."

Rawden intrepidly held Elrond's gaze, as if he were expecting a _but they'll be back, don't worry, _or a _I think,_ or perhaps a _but that only means they can't eat anymore_, but Elrond said nothing.

"Oh," said Rawden, finally. "I thought so – " The last word died in his throat as if an invisible hand had begun to strangle him. Elrond saw the awful comprehension fill Rawden's mind like a numbing fog and stay his tears, his expression, and his voice. Elrond had a vision of the boy twenty years older, wearing the same expression that had just cloaked his features, the face of someone who had nobody to grieve to and so remained trapped in a state of unbelieving paralysis.

"You can cry, Rawden," Elrond said. For a moment nothing happened, and then the boy sniffed, hiccupped, and finally let out the first sob. He cried as a small thing cast away, alone and fearful – a quiet, inward grief that Elrond found he could not stand to watch and listen to. The elf unfastened his hands from where they'd been locked together on his lap and almost didn't reach out to the boy – he was still, after all, a complete stranger – but the simple action of drawing his hands apart was enough for Rawden to leave his perch on the rock and cram himself into Elrond's chest. Elrond hugged him and the crying grew louder and the boy buried his face in the elf's cloak.

Elrond hadn't planned on shedding any tears. After all, it had been less than forty years since the hellish siege of Barad-dûr, and he'd seen more pain and loss there than he suspected he ever would before sailing West. He recognized now that he had not grown numb to such pains, and was relieved.

"_Amin hiraetha, aier, amin hiraetha*,_" he whispered, and for long moments neither moved save the tremendous heaving of Rawden's body. The stars continued to wheel overhead, and by the time Rawden had calmed somewhat, the eastern horizon had a pale cast to it.

"What happens when we die?" the boy asked finally, through the remnants of tears and through Elrond's cloak, in which he was still wrapped.

"I do not know what happens when Men die. Nobody does."

"What happens when elves die?" Rawden asked, though it was less out of childlike curiosity than out of the desperate need to understand something that was unknowable.

"Most will sail west to a place called Valinor."

"Is your mom in Valinor yet?"

"I believe she is."

"Why can't _we_ go to Valinor?"

"Because," Elrond said, wondering what he thought he was doing, attempting to explain such a concept to a grief-stricken boy, "you have been blessed with the Gift of Man."

"Is that death?"

"Death is one part of it."

"So death isn't really that bad?" the boy asked, but his voice became thin halfway through the question and Elrond knew that it was out of delusional hope, not out of acceptance or understanding, that the words came.

"That is my belief," he responded quietly, and, not wanting the conversation to go any further, he pushed Rawden away slightly so he could see his face. "Now we must make haste to Amon Sûl. You must be chilled and tired."

The boy nodded and climbed back into position, arms locked around Elrond's neck. He sniffed intermittently but was otherwise silent. Elrond had been called a wise one by many, but in the matters of mortal grief he had little experience – let alone how mortal children are expected to deal with it. It seemed to him that having a fit of tears right away was a good thing but at the same time he couldn't believe that that had been the worst of it. In all probability the grieving would go on for years, far past his childhood, until he reached his own understanding about what the Gift of Man meant – or Curse of Man, as had become popular with mortals as of late. The phrase irked Elrond to no end.

Within the hour Rawden's hands came apart around Elrond's neck and the boy just about slipped off his back before startling awake and clinging anew to the elf. After the third time this happened Elrond decided that carrying the boy in his arms would at this point be safer, if not slightly more uncomfortable on his end, but Rawden was very slight. Wishing very much that he had a horse, Elrond tracked south and west towards warmth and safety and tried not to grow any more attached to the child sleeping in his arms. It was one of the worst hikes he had ever taken, despite having taken many a jaunt straight into the maws of enemies. In those instances at least he had been prepared for what was to come. This situation had crept up on him, unpredictable as the path of lightning.

Amon Sûl came into view as the sun lit the tops of the tallest hills and Rawden didn't awake until they had entered the Tower's gate. After that he followed Elrond closely as the elf lord informed the Tower guards of possible sorcery taking place in the Weather Hills, by hill men, and of the murders. They were granted a room and food, and a horse when they wished it. Rawden slept for a time longer but would not close his eyes after the sun had passed its apex.

It took them three and a half days of wandering along the East-West Road before Rawden recognized a landmark that pointed him in the direction of his uncles' house. Rawden had been very quiet since the night they traveled to Amon Sûl, and rarely smiled but rarely frowned. Late morning of the fourth day they came upon a small house at the edge of a wood, with a large garden and a pen with four curious goats, a smoking chimney and three apple trees that still clung to the last few withered fruits of the season. The smell of a tart in the oven came to them plain as day. Rawden said this was his uncle's house, and at the threshold of the walkway he hesitated. No doubt part of him wished to believe that upon opening the door he'd find his family waiting for him. No doubt part of him wanted badly never to see the door to this place open to him again, for its emptiness upon opening would be the finality of what he already knew but still dreamed was only a nightmare.

"Come to the door with me?" Rawden asked at last, looking up at Elrond. Elrond had intended to wait at the end of the walk – politeness told him not to enter the property before being invited – but he knew that the boy was aware of the distressing conversation that would immediately follow the opening of the door. And so, leaving the horse to watch from the road, Elrond followed three steps behind Rawden until the boy came to the door and held up his small hand to knock, drew it away, put it back, and gave it two very solid raps.

**-)O(- **

_T.A 129_

_December 30_

"Yes, come in," Elrond said absently, tearing his eyes from the tome lying open on a desk. The door was pushed open and his counselor Erestor appeared, dark hair and clothing collecting the evening shadows, as ever.

"A message for you, my lord," he said, stepping aside. Elrond stood and came forward to meet the man who now approached, who wore a traveling cloak and riding gear.

"Lord Elrond," said the traveler, bowing his head respectfully before handing over a sealed envelope. Elrond didn't recognize the stamp, so, after asking Erestor to make the messenger comfortable for as long as he wished to stay, he took a seat back at the desk, broke the seal, and pulled out a sheaf of papers, written in very fine script on thin parchment.

"_My dear friend Elrond, Lord of Rivendell,_

_ It has been far too long since last we spoke – though perhaps to you it has only been an instance. I will be blunt, as you have taught me to be with words and writing. My health is poor – so much so that I believe by the time you read this I will have died. I have lived a long and very happy life, considering, and I do realize how very much I owe to you – I know you are scowling at that now, and you would tell me that I owe you nothing – but you cannot teach a dead man new wisdom._

_I suppose this is goodbye and everything, but rather than dwelling on that I will instead make this into a final thank-you letter. You have shared much insight with me throughout my lifetime. I have heard you mutter under your breath that your words of advice to others would someday be discovered to be mere folly, or that they would come back to haunt you. I am only one humble, mortal man but it is my staunch opinion that such thoughts on your part are quite ungrounded and silly._

_ As you know, I have kept a journal of interesting things for the greater part of my life, from the moment you sent me that journal and quill on my 10th birthday. I daresay you were the catalyst for my becoming the town scrivener. My memory is no longer sharp as a whip but my dearest wife and daughter have gone through nearly all of my journals with me and I wish you to know that your name comes up in my scratchings almost as often as the name of my Uncle Linod. So my wife and daughter have upon my request cut out the bits that I thought you ought to read, and included them here in the envelope. Goodness knows I won't need them where I am bound. _

_ "T.A 40_

_ Lord Elrond has sent this book to me for to write my days in. Today I went fishing with Uncle Linod and we caught a walleye and a sheephead and another walleye but the other walleye was too small so we threw it back. When we gutted the first one it had bugs in its meat, Uncle says they are parasites. Aunt Eudice is having a bad day because the boy goat got over the pen and ate one of her linens."_

_ "T.A 45_

_ Today someone told me that Elrond was the Lord of Rivendell and one of the wisest and most venerable elves. I knew he was wise but not _that _wise. Uncle says he never told me because I never asked and because it didn't matter. _

_ I met a girl named Chellis at the market today. I was bold like Elrond keeps telling me to be with my words and I asked Chellis to come to the dance with me. She said no."_

_ "T.A 60_

_ It is already three days since, and Chellis still will not stop laughing that I dropped my ring in the lake after the ceremony. I am thankful she finds it so amusing – I suppose that is why I married her. _

_ I have just looked back on my recent entries and realized I have not yet written about one elf lord in attendance of our wedding. Lord Elrond watched from the back looking like a figure out of a painting of old – or, at the least, that is what he looked like to our humble country eyes. How our friends were impressed! I was finally able to introduce him to Chellis and we spent a considerable time afterwards ragging him that I had gone and found a wife whereas he, old as the hills as he was, had not. Imagine, me doing something he had not! I felt my teasing may have hit harder than intended, so I reminded him that his House in Rivendell was full of people who loved him absolutely. He responded to Chellis and I by saying it is hollow to be loved by all when you are not also loved by one._

_ But he let slip that he had recently come into the company of the most excellent and radiant Celebrían, lady of Lórien, and his eyes went a bit glazed as he talked of her, which we found quite amusing. Chellis had asked him why it took so very long for elves to find their mates. I do not recall his response word-for-word but it had something to do with having to face eternity and not wanting to do this alone, or some very elvish-sounding thing, but behind his words there hid a smile and the truth of the matter, which he kept secret."_

_ "T.A 64_

_ Uncle Linod's memorial service was in the most pleasant of weather, at which I am sure he would have sniffed and said something to the effect of it being good weather if one wanted to paint the surrounding gardens or go swimming but absolutely rotten weather for fishing._

_ Our little Anselda, of course, does not understand yet what has happened, but her saucer eyes watch our every move. She has not cried, perhaps because we have not made it into an occasion to cry. _

_ Lord Elrond came from Rivendell to bid Linod's spirit a good journey, and brought with him his friend Celebrían. It is clear to me that the two will end up tying the knot some day. Perhaps I will be around to see it. Celebrían, who spent much time entertaining Anselda, does seem to have an aura about her; none at the service could scarce take their eyes off of her (none of the men, at least). The lady's hand was kissed by more than one mouth that day. I must interject that to me she is no match for my Chellis, but then, nobody is. More deserving of an elf than Elrond I cannot imagine her to meet. _

_ He and Chellis and I spent a long time over a candle and silence and exchanged some words on endings. Elrond tells me that he and I have already had a conversation about death; many years ago, on the same night as the death of my parents and sister. I do not remember the words that were exchanged so long ago._

_ Lord Elrond then told us the story of a great battle he had fought, long ago and against a great evil enemy. He told us of the very moment he first began to doubt the strength of Man, who he saw had begun to fall to fear in the face of death. _

_ I replied and informed him that there were still those Men who knew their Gift for what it was – not a curse but a blessing. This brought a smile to the elf's face, which I was comforted to see, as he had grown very somber. Dear Chellis agreed with me and said she in fact shuddered to imagine life without end, that without the knowledge of one last great adventure, she was not sure she would retain her sanity. As she spoke I would bet quite a bit that it was sympathy she was trying to hide behind her eyes, but despite her efforts I think Elrond saw it, for after she spoke he very tenderly took her hand in his and lay a kiss upon it."_

_There it is. That is all I shall squeeze out of my volumes of writings – or at least, all I can convince Chellis to cut out for me. There are many more that I may have included if I did not have other letters to be composing now. I would like you to know that, here in my twilight, I am not afraid, because I knew you. Your words that night in the Weather Hills stayed in my mind, even though their source was lost for long years. The image of you bending in the firelight to kiss the hand of my wife was imprinted in my memory and I feel at once at peace with your respect and reverence._

_As of late I have been working on translating an archaic collection of books written in Adûnaic into Westron. My drafts are unpolished and there are still some bits I have not put into Westron, and I do not believe I will be getting around to finishing them. They are yours for the taking, as I think they would raise your interest, if not your ire. I think Chellis would treasure your company if you would come over to receive them. _

_The last I hear, Celebrían was about to have twins. My goodness. If your hands were not full already, Master Elrond, they are about to be. _

_ I dither. I have said all I set out to say. Thank you for everything, and the best, the very _best_ of wishes to you and yours. _

_ At last and very fondly,_

_ R."_

* * *

**A/N:** *_I am sorry, little one, I am sorry._

_Update: I just realized how inaccurate I've made the projected travel time/distance between Annúminas to Imladris to be. My bad.  
_


	4. Rough Reunion

**4: Rough Reunion**

_Aragorn is sent to assassinate an assassin sent to assassinate King Thengel while he visits Erebor. Keep in mind that Aragorn is only 26 or so here. Aragorn and Elrond. This is a reply to a plot gift from SerenLyall._

_There is a long, awkward reason that the setting is the way it is. I try to explain the setting early on but if it's fuzzy to you… don't worry, it doesn't really matter anyways. Small details. _

* * *

_T.A 2957_

"The Lonely Mountain," Havhem said solemnly. "Throne of the Longbeards. Kingdom under the Mountain. Seat of the Arkenstone." Aragorn, who rode next to the marshal, nodded respectfully. The sight of the mountain had been looming up at them as they rode closer, near the end of the train of horses. It had been a long ride from Edoras and Aragorn was very much looking forward to reaching their final destination and resting for a few days – and getting out of earshot from Havhem. Or rather, out of voiceshot. Havhem had barely stopped talking during the weeks they'd been on the move, and most of it had been recalling lore that Aragorn already knew rather well, though he wasn't about to tell that to King Thengel's marshal. The man was chatty but at least he was company.

Aragorn, who was not a seasoned wanderer yet – barely seven years out of Rivendell – was only now becoming familiar with the loneliness that came with the masking of one's identity. Many of the men they traveled with would know him as Thorongil, as he'd been riding with them for months beforehand, but under Havhem's orders, Aragorn had disguised himself for this particular trek. Havhem had approached Aragorn a week before King Thengel and his cohort had left for Erebor, telling him that Thengel himself had requested Aragorn's presence. They'd gotten word of a possible third-party assassination aimed at Thengel, to be executed during his stay with the dwarves of Erebor. The assassin and their party was reported to be one of the same bands that Aragorn and the Dúnedains had scuffled with in the Wilds years before – Havhem was concerned that they would realize who Aragorn was and attempt to kill him as well, so had asked Aragorn to stay subtle, just in case.

By 'subtle', Havhem apparently meant that Aragorn always wear a dark, encryptive cloak, a bandana over the lower half of his face, and not to speak without good reason. Aragorn was sure he looked more suspicious with these additions, but while Havhem may not have been as up on lore as Aragorn was, surely his years serving Rohan would have given him a better idea of how to conceal oneself.

Whatever the case, it wouldn't matter soon. They'd be under the mountain by nightfall, and darkness would be all around them. No doubt both he and this foreseen assassin would be naught but shadows to each other's eyes. _If _such an assassin would even be there. Aragorn was not completely convinced that there was a threat to King Thengel, actually, as only Havhem seemed to be worried. Havhem was touched by paranoia, that much Aragorn had gathered. Perhaps all for the better, though, for one of the King's marshals to be so careful.

King Thengel and his flags rode out front to be welcomed by Náin Ironfoot and his contingent. Havhem, in the meantime, regaled Aragorn with yet more stories from within the private politic of Edoras. Aragorn found he had more trouble paying attention, now that they were actually at the foot of the mountain. The dwarves, Havhem had told him, had invited Thengel to Erebor to discuss 'commercial and landshare opportunities', which everybody knew meant that the dwarves meant to investigate what lay behind Helm's Deep. Náin had stopped trying to be civil with Thengel's late father, Fengel, as most had during the latter years of the greedy king's reign. Now that a kinder king had taken up office, Náin meant to once again broach the subject. Aragorn admired the dwarf's tact in inviting Thengel to the mountain, rather than Náin inviting himself to Edoras, and he was grateful for the chance to explore this part of Middle-earth.

As soon as he could upon entering under the mountain, Aragorn extracted himself from Havhem and took it upon himself to get to know the layout of the city. He had seen many great cities in his young years already, and could not say that this was the cheeriest of dwellings, dark as it was, but it was grand, without a doubt – the imposing magnificence of the interior architecture, the buttresses and columns and keeps, kept his mouth on a loose hinge for quite a while – impossible to say how long, without the aid of the open sky. Dwarves trailed to and fro, the clamor of their ever-present mail and weaponry making them seem like the very rocks come alive. There were several main chambers that Aragorn struggled to situate into the map he was drawing in his mind, and they were all lit from above by majestic chandeliers that glittered with stones that captured hues he had never before seen. Torches lined every wall and pillar, and for all the stone that lay between them and the wind outside, there was enough light to make it bearable for a wandering man. He wagered even an elf could get by for a few days in such conditions.

The dwarves had prepared a great feast in honor of King Thengel's presence, and before Aragorn's eyes the stone tables were being set with fine cutlery and encrusted goblets above crimson table runners. Náin's throne was high at the head of the table, alongside the seat they'd prepared for Thengel, which was no less elaborate. Aragorn could smell the food that would soon be out.

"Thorongil," whispered a voice in his ear. Havhem was hanging over Aragorn's shoulder.

"Yes, marshal."

"Do you see that above this hall is a great rectangular dome?"

Aragorn nodded.

"Do you see that there are several floors above, one which connects to a gallery that runs along the perimeter of the open space above us?"

"Yes, marshal Havhem, I see that," Aragorn replied, trying to bite back sarcasm. The marshal _had_ brought him here to keep his eyes peeled, hadn't he?

"That is where you must go. The assassin will likely throw or shoot something, and what better place to do it than from above?"

"And risk missing their mark? That is a fair ways up, sir. If the assassin is of the company that you suspect, the same company that I have fought with before this, we needn't be too concerned with their aim."

"And you would risk your king's life on that assumption?"

"… I would do as you recommend, sir."

"Good," Havhem said, and gave Aragorn a light shove towards a staircase. "I recommend the gallery. Signal if you see anything."

Havhem vaporized into the crowd before Aragorn could ask him what he'd meant by 'signal'. He shrugged it off and started up the stairs. Despite his doubtfulness, however, his footsteps lightened and his movements became more cautious as he came higher up the stairs; the torches were spaced further and the shadows grew longer and darker. Havhem was probably right in one sense – any good assassin would have made their way up to the gallery for the safety of darkness, if not for a clear shot.

Once at the top of the stairs, Aragorn kept to the shadows and crept to the stone rail, and leaned out as much as he dared. The people down in the hall were small now, but still he could pick out Thengel and Náin, talking jovially above what must have been cuts of roast pork. Dwarves and men littered the rest of the table, drinking and eating, their chatter filling the colossal chamber with the hive-like sound of a city. Havhem, Aragorn noted with slight concern, was talking with what looked to be considerable urgency to a host of his guards, and Aragorn wondered if the assassin had been spotted. The marshal pushed Thengel away from a conversation and towards the door of a sideroom. Aragorn watched Havhem closely, waiting for the marshal to look up and give him 'the signal', but this did not happen. Some of the guards slipped out of the hall and disappeared into one of the side corridors.

A shadow heaved in the corner of his eye. Sidesight was always more perceptive than what is seen straight ahead; Elrohir had taught Aragorn that much early on. Someone had joined him up in the gallery. Aragorn resisted the urge to spin around and fling his knife. Instead he backed further into the shadow, crouched, and tried to trace the shadow's movements.

It was difficult; at first it was as if there were two shadows, and then as if the shadow itself had a shadow, which made no sense given the lack of light up here. But the person was trying not to be seen, which was enough for Aragorn to fall into a sprint, knife in hand, towards the shadow. Curiously, the shadow was not approaching the railing so as to take aim at somebody; it was disappearing down a connecting corridor.

Aragorn knew he'd been spotted. Dark as the shadows were, they'd failed to hide him. He broke out into a dead run, his foot hit something, and his hands only barely caught himself as he smacked into the unyielding ground. Heart racing, hands scrabbling for the dropped knife, he groped the ground behind him until he found what it was that had obstructed him.

A body. Quick examination revealed the person to be freshly dead, cloaked, a dagger still sheathed in the belt. The shadow that had gone down the corridor had probably just committed this murder. _Two competing assassins, then,_ he thought as he came to his feet and followed down the corridor. Two groups vying for the right to kill King Thengel. He could not guess as to who they were or why they wanted to assassinate Thengel, but he was grateful at least that one had already taken care of the other. Now it was his job to dispatch the second assassin before the second could dispatch their King.

The corridor grew dark; the torch arms were empty. The dwarves must have moved the torches meant for this corridor down into the main hall for the feast. Aragorn's night vision was much better than that of most men, though, so he ran on, guided by only the bright flares of the few remaining lights. No sign of the assassin; Aragorn knew he'd wasted time up in the gallery tripping on the body and finding out what it was. He pushed himself faster; this hall led down, which is where Thengel was. He would not let an assassination take place this night.

Up ahead a junction was illuminated; the branch to the right was dark, and the branch to the left was bright, and growing increasingly noisy. He slowed as he came to the branch – from the sounds of it, a group of armed men were running his way. Havhem's men, no doubt. They came into view within moments. Aragorn ran to meet them.

"Have you seen him?" he asked loudly, over their clamor. The uniformed men stopped immediately to stare at him. "Have you seen the assassin?" he asked again. "He was right in front of me, and came either this way or went down the other hall. Has he passed you?"

"Yes, he came this way," one of the men said, after a pause. "Just about ran smack into us. One of us got him with a blade but he turned tail and ran the other way…"

"He must be down the right side then. Follow me, we must catch him," Aragorn said over his shoulder, starting to sprint back to the other hallway.

"Wait now, who are you?" asked the soldiers behind him, who hesitated where they stood. Aragorn had forgotten he was wearing concealing clothing, of course they hadn't known him when they'd seen him.

"Thorongil," he called to them, using the name he kept in Rohan. "Quickly now!" This seemed to move them and he heard their steps catch to his. He thought he had walked this corridor earlier that day, or night, but now his heart was running in his feet and his mind was piqued to shadows and sounds, not the map in his head, so he couldn't be sure where this was leading. He _could _be sure, however, that the men behind him would be of no use; they fell behind already. No doubt they were having trouble navigating through the gloom. The torches they carried would only serve to blind them to anything save what lay a body's length in front of them.

A branch came ahead again, and Aragorn paused, sniffed, and asked the air. The branch to the right seemed disturbed. He considered waiting and sending the troops down the other but every second lost was counting against Thengel's life so he took to the right. Moments later another branch came and, acting on signals too small to register, he took the left and acknowledged to himself that he now had absolutely no clue as to where he was. He burst into what felt like a small chamber, very ill-lit, and paused, then stopped. Something in the air here –

_There_. In the gloom. There was the shadow, crouching in the corner. Aragorn didn't know what kind of weapon the assassin had, so he whipped his knife out of its sheath and drew his hand back to throw, hoping to end it all quickly, but in a second the assassin was no longer where Aragorn had aimed – it was coming at him, low and fast. Aragorn readjusted and whipped the knife, heard it hum briefly, and then it careened into the wall. The assassin had ducked and rolled, and now, unharmed, sprang catlike at Aragorn's chest. Aragorn dropped and twisted, rolled, and lunged for where he thought his knife was, noting the sudden stench of blood. _Not unharmed_, he remembered. The soldiers had hurt the assassin earlier. Aragorn was at an advantage.

Belatedly he realized the assassin had escaped his senses. Before he could act a pair of arms had come under his elbows, drew them up and back, and then hands slammed against his ears and latched onto his head. The assassin's body weight was driving into his back, forcing him down. _I know this move_, Aragorn thought – the assassin would try to snap his neck on impact with the ground. A split second of panic as Aragorn tried and failed to roll to the right, unable to disrupt the assassin's precise balance. Muscle memory saved him a moment before impact, his legs wrenching to the side and throwing his right shoulder down first. He rolled right as savagely as he could, forcing the assassin to abandon their hold on his head, but not before managing to twist a sharp pain into Aragorn's neck.

He had landed within reach of his knife, and now snatched it up and aimed a desperate stab at the assassin now half-below him, but the angle was impossible and his sight wasn't keeping up with the rapid movements of his foe, whose black cloak was doing nothing to make the situation more lucid – in fact the assassin's entire body was clothed in black from hands to face to foot. He stabbed at the assassin but the blade didn't go in far enough to damage. Aragorn tried to dodge a fist but he'd detected it too slowly and it deflected off his temple. Any more square of a hit, he knew, and he would have been dead. Still, his vision left him completely for a long second, during which he struggled wildly to immobilize the assassin, at least until his vision returned.

He had had the impression that assassins were mostly subtle hands and good shots, but crummy in outright face-to-face. It was clear to him that _this_ man was not to be trifled with. Though the assassin drew no blade, he seemed not only to know exactly what it took to kill a person bare-handed, but also had quite enough strength and skill to do so.

The assassin refused to be immobilized, and his legs, which Aragorn should have accounted for, were suddenly pinching him around the waist and then his world flipped violently, and he was looking up once again at a fist. Aragorn raised his forearm in defense and the shock of the blow seemed to shatter the bones of his arm into his face, which was better than where he knew the blow had been intended – the bridge of his nose, which assuredly would have killed him.

He cursed with the sudden realization that he'd dropped his knife again – just out of reach to his left. He knew the assassin on top of him was about to aim another punch, and Aragorn's reach would not allow him to attack the assassin's face. A moment of foreboding blinded him and he was sure this was his end. He had failed Thengel, he had failed Havhem, and now –

And now his body decided to move of its own accord. Aragorn heaved up and to the side before twisting his torso, and the assassin made a snatch at his face – managing only to rip off the bandana – before being thrown off into a lopsided crouch. Aragorn kicked as hard as he could and the assassin hit the stone wall, and slumped down into a weak kneel, stunned and panting. Aragorn snatched up his knife, lunged towards the assassin, took a handful of cloakfront and started to haul him upright, and then something miraculous happened. The man underneath the cloak disappeared, and Aragorn was so shocked that for a critical second he could do nothing but stare at the cloak draped in his fist.

An abrupt, excruciating pressure on his shoulder caused his cloak-holding arm to drop to his side, where it was taken and wrenched behind his back. He had time to let out a sharp cry before he'd been whirled around and pushed against the stone wall. One hard punch and Aragorn's head would be broken between fist and stone. The assassin was not two feet from his face, and he knew that what happened in the next half-second would decide which one of them would live.

Several things occurred simultaneously. One was the assassin's fist on the drawback of a killing blow to Aragorn's nose. Another was Aragorn's blade hand thrusting up towards the assassin's throat. And finally, Aragorn's mind processed a new dynamic to their situation, which was _light. _

Suddenly, the assassin had a face, the assassin had eyes, the eyes were staring into Aragorn's, and the eyes of the assassin belonged to Elrond.

Aragorn's weapon hand jerked wildly to the side and the knife flew across the chamber, while the other's fist came to a stop before his nose, the gloved fingers uncurled, and then landed gently on the side of Aragorn's face.

"_Goheno nin, _Aragorn!" Elrond hissed. "I almost killed you! Are you alright?"

"Yes, but what are you – "

"Come," said Elrond tersely, grabbing up his cloak and dragging his newfound foster son behind him towards the far exit of the chamber. Aragorn's arm burned with pain and he bit back a grimace. "The men are almost upon us." _Of course_, Aragorn thought. The sudden light. Havhem's men had finally drawn near, and now their torchlight was getting stronger.

"They are after an assassin to Thengel, we needn't run," Aragorn protested, dragging the elf to a halt. Elrond was wheezing, now that their skirmish had ended, and he doubled over with his hands on his knees. "Are you well, my lord?"

Elrond straightened, still breathing hard, and pierced Aragorn with his gaze. Aragorn watched a realization manifest itself to Elrond, whose eyes narrowed suddenly. The elf once again grabbed Aragorn's wrist and started for the exit.

"_Come_. Quickly, Estel, they are not after Thengel."

"…Wait, _what_?" asked Aragorn, giving in and following the insistent elf with a stumble. Elrond had made a point of calling Aragorn by his true name after his identity had been revealed to him when he reached twenty years. The fact that Elrond had slipped just now and called him _Estel_ showed how tangled his thoughts must have been. They were in the hallway again, and Aragorn could hear the soldiers behind, yelling now, and running. No doubt the soldiers could see their retreating backs and hear their labored footsteps.

"Trust me," gasped Elrond from in front, "they aim to kill _you_."

Aragorn almost stopped in his tracks in order to better judge if Elrond had a debilitating head wound, but Aragorn had never known Elrond to be someone not to trust, and so, despite his disbelief, he kept running.

"What? That makes – "

They had come to an intersection and Elrond wrenched them both careening around the corner. The gloom increased and Aragorn found that now, after his eyes had seen torchlight, he could see nothing at all, and had to trust Elrond's sight and guiding hand.

"That makes no sense," he finished through his breath, and Elrond didn't respond. The voices and footsteps behind them had risen in excitement but already they grew more faint. Elrond continued to swing around corners left and right, and they climbed one short flight of stairs (Aragorn tried valiantly not to trip, and failed on the last step), and descended again down a steep, chiseled slope. Here Elrond halted completely and put out a hand to still Aragorn, and they stood in the dark for a moment. Aragorn could hear little past their harsh tandem breathing and through the pulse in his ears, so he left the listening to Elrond.

"We've lost them," the elf whispered finally, "for now." He took Aragorn's hand and they started again at a brisk walk.

"How do you know they mean to kill me?" Aragorn asked, curiosity biting at his heels.

"Marshal Havhem is here, is he not?"

"Yes, it is he who recommended I come."

Aragorn took Elrond's silence as an affirmation, but to what, he could not guess. Begrudgingly he kept the questions within and did his best to follow and not stumble. There was simply no reason for Elrond to be here – disguised, nonetheless – and no reason that Aragorn could see that King Thengel would want Aragorn dead. Aragorn saw Thengel as someone he could place his values under and fight for, in fact. Briefly, Aragorn wondered if Elrond was the assassin Havhem had cautioned him about, but that made no sense. Unless Elrond was mistaken about the intentions of King Thengel, the elf would never raise a weapon in harm. And Aragorn knew that Elrond would not make such a mistake.

"Where are we going?" asked Aragorn, and noticed a faint glow ahead of them. Elrond dropped Aragorn's hand and made for the light.

"I hope that we head in the direction of the Great Hall." The glow was from a solitary torch, he saw.

"Why, when there are more soldiers there?"

"That is where the king is. He must be informed immediately of this breach in loyalty."

"_What _breach in loyalty?" Aragorn asked, frustrated. They had reached the torch now, and Elrond took the torch down from its holder. It trembled in his grasp and illuminated the grimace on the elf's face. Aragorn forgot about his question as he remembered that the soldiers behind them had said they'd hurt 'the assassin'. Indeed, a short, diagonal slice of tunic was hanging across Elrond's side, heavy with blood. With horror, Aragorn remembered what he'd done during their brief fight. The elf had turned to continue down the hallway but Aragorn caught his shoulder and stared at his torso, looking for damage.

"Oh, my lord, I stabbed you!"

"Bad stab. You hit bone."

"Your sternum stopped you from being skewered!" Aragorn cried, belatedly stifling his voice.

"Yes. That is its job, actually," Elrond wheezed. "Come."

"Your hand is shaking."

"There is nothing to be done about it," Elrond said, and walked. Aragorn followed, realizing that he was feeling none too well himself. The muscles down one side of his neck had gone numb and his head throbbed painfully. His right forearm felt as if it was afire and he hoped it wasn't broken into too many pieces. He knew he was lucky, though, to have lived through a fight with Elrond.

The corridor widened and the sides became more defined. It joined another far wider hallway, which seemed to be a main connecting path that lead to the dining hall. Elrond found an empty torch-arm and placed their flame against the wall. Soon they could hear the roar and buzz of the feast. The smell of food came sharply back to Aragorn, and ahead down the well-lit way several dwarves toted platters heaped with yet more to be passed. Elrond stopped then, and raised the hood of his cloak again to obscure his ears. His hair had been pulled behind his back into a braid, and his clothing was distinctly mannish.

"Why do you go undercover?" Aragorn asked.

"If the dwarves knew an elf had snuck into their mountain they would have a grand fit. Put your hood on – remember, you're a target. Bring us to Thengel, avoid the guards."

Luckily, most of the guards had made themselves scarce. Aragorn thought they must be tracking the catacombs for 'the assassin'. Havhem himself was nowhere to be seen. The dwarves and the men not under Havhem's command seemed to still be having a merry time and Aragorn slowed so as not to raise attention as they passed to be under the great vault under the mountain.

Thengel was no longer at the head of the table and Aragorn hesitated before remembering that Havhem had stowed the king away in the first sideroom before sending the soldiers out to search. He headed for that door, hoping that enough ale had already been consumed to make two passing cloaked figures seem unremarkable. All it would take would be one soldier to raise the alarm, he knew. Indeed he now saw several of them, standing guard for the main hallways, but the attentions of the guards were not aimed at them. The door of the room that he suspected held Thengel was, amazingly, unguarded, a matter which both angered and puzzled Aragorn up until the moment he put his hand forward, turned the latch, and pushed the door open.

Thengel, splendid under a small crown and a rich, embroidered tunic, turned slightly from his seat. He raised his eyebrows at the appearance of the two entering. Aragorn shut the door, latched it, and turned to his king. One of Thengel's eyebrows drooped in confusion.

"My lord, where is your guard?" Aragorn asked, at a loss for what else to say.

"I have asked for them to bring me an ale and a cut of pork. Havhem may have me quarantined in this cave all by myself but I shan't fail to enjoy the hospitality of Erebor. I say, is that you, Thorongil? Who is this other man? Did you just lock us in?"

Aragorn turned helplessly to Elrond, at a loss for what to say. Elrond had been taking the moment to breathe, and now went down on one knee and bowed his head.

"My lord Thengel," Elrond said.

"Are you hurt?" the king asked with alarm, and finally rose from his chair.

"Nothing that merits your concern."

"Well, I'm afraid I'm quite concerned now, against your wishes. Havhem has cautioned me of a possible attempt on my life and now before me I have a wounded man that I have never met, and Thorongil – Thorongil, what is your business here, anyways? I was told you rode west before we departed, on a scouting mission."

"My king, Havhem told me that you asked for me to come on this journey. I thought you knew of my presence here."

"If I may," Elrond interjected, and started to lower himself down to lean against the back wall. "I believe I can shed some light on our situation." Aragorn's worries were torn between the elf's health and the well-being of his king, and he wasn't at all sure of what kinds of things the king should be wary of at the moment. He reminded himself that if Elrond had made it this far with an injury, he was in little danger.

"Your marshal Havhem," started Elrond, "is power-starved. Have you noticed?"

The king did not respond right away. He looked taken aback that such a stranger would address him this way, but he considered the question.

"I have noticed that Havhem has more fire in his blood than my other marshals."

"And you know of his deeds under your late father, King Fengel?"

"My father brought out the worst in everybody he touched. I do not begrudge Havhem for doing what my father asked."

"Havhem has authored a proposal against Thorongil's life."

"This is a brave accusation," the king said, voice grave. His eyes flickered to Aragorn's, but Aragorn had the same questions that Thengel did. "Why would my marshal do such a thing?"

"You have given Thorongil much power already over your men and horses. Havhem would kill him so that he himself may have a chance to wield such power. Havhem ordered Thorongil to come under the pretense of protecting _you, _my lord, when in fact Havhem would have had the disguised Thorongil killed, called a common assassin, and then would have given himself the title of your savior."

"Havhem would have told me that he had killed the assassin… Thorongil?"

"He may not have attempted to convince you that it was Thorongil himself who had made an attempt on your life, but either way, he would have been polishing his image."

"And how," Thengel asked, eyes narrowing, "am I to know that you do not author your own plot against Havhem? In my eyes you yourself look the assassin. By what right do you know these things, and how can you expect my trust?"

Aragorn saw Elrond hesitate, no doubt torn between earning the king's trust by title alone or by some other clever means. The latter seemed far too complicated for this situation.

"This is Elrond Peredhel," Aragorn said, "Lord of Rivendell. You may trust my word on his fidelity, as I was raised in his house." Elrond reached to lower his hood, and King Thengel squinted across the room before coming forward a few steps.

"_Le suilon,_ my lord," he said, "and pardon my not recognizing you."

"I believe we have met but once before this, _aran_," the elf replied with a small smile, "besides which I do not mean to be recognized by anybody. Even my own kin."

"I am ashamed of my poor hospitality. You are wounded, let me send for – "

"Please," said Elrond, "look first to the safety of Thorongil. He must be afforded safe passage from the mountain. I fear it will be a lengthy process to clean up this mess, and in the meantime perhaps it is best if Thorongil – and myself – be out of reach."

Aragorn almost protested, wanting to be around to confront Havhem himself, but he realized that Elrond's advice was logical. His rebelliousness was, in part, no doubt the remnants of his younger years, pushing back against the rules and advice of his father figure – usually to find out later why said rules and advice were given in the first place.

"It will be done," Thengel said. "I will send my personal guards, whom I trust, to secure a safe way out. I invite you both to stay outside of the mountain until things are in order and men have been put into their place. I would talk again with you both when time permits."

"As you wish," Elrond replied, and started to stand. As Aragorn helped him up the door to the chamber turned, then rattled. The king unlatched the door before an alarm could be called, and waved in the two guards who bore ale and food. Aragorn tensed, but saw that they were not wearing the red colors of Havhem's men. These were the aforementioned personal guards.

It was an admirably quick task for the guards to lead them unnoticed from the dinner hall and out under the mountain, and though it had only been a short while, Aragorn was relieved to see stars again. He judged it to be late still, as the morning star had not yet appeared. The weather was agreeable, though the mountain wind was carrying a chill, and the moon was almost full, hanging in the southern sky.

They made their way up above the entrance of the mountain, to keep an eye on who came and who went, and Elrond tried to insist on inspecting Aragorn's head, neck, and forearm. Aragorn refused to sit still until he had taken a look at the gash on Elrond's side. It had damaged only skin and muscle, and there was nothing Aragorn could do that Elrond could not. Aragorn then coerced Elrond into letting him make sure that the stab wound on the elf's chest was not of concern. Elrond protested mightily, saying it was not bothering him, but Aragorn's guilt at having stabbed him overrode Elrond's stubbornness. In the end, it was so small and shallow that both shared a laugh over it.

"I see where all my careful instruction has led you with the knife," Elrond teased, pulling his tunic back down.

"It was dark," Aragorn protested. "It was dark and your clothing was dark and you wouldn't hold still. I meant to stab upwards from below your ribs, just like you taught me."

"No doubt had you succeeded we would not now be laughing."

"Where did you find such clothing, anyway? I would not expect torn gloves and tattered boots to be privy to the wardrobe of an elf lord. You look very much a man."

"The boots and gloves are from long ago," the elf replied with a sly smile. "I was not gentle on clothing before this age. Celebrían wished for me to be rid of all those old cloaks and trousers, but I kept an outfit. I thought I might need them someday. Except the tunic, all my old tunics were shredded, completely useless. This one is yours."

"Without my permission?" Aragorn said in mock indignation.

"I did not expect to be seeing you here! Now come," Elrond said, and his buoyant tone turned somber. "I worry for your neck. I am so very sorry that I tried to snap it. Here, sit." Aragorn relented and lowered himself to sit in front of Elrond. The moment the elf's hands touched his neck Aragorn felt the wind grow warmer and more gentle against his skin. He closed his eyes as Elrond soothed the pulled muscles and put them back into order. His hands moved to rest on either side of Aragorn's head then – the same hand position that, with different applied pressure, would easily kill. The hands drew much of the hammering pain from his temple and replaced it with a cool haze that dampened what pain remained.

Aragorn did not track the position of the moon in the sky but though it felt as if Elrond's administrations lasted for a long stretch, it was probably a short time before the elf asked him to turn around again.

"Your arm," Elrond said, and Aragorn held back a sigh, rolling up his sleeve. No doubt this would not be as pleasant of a healing. The elf took the arm gently and immediately his face fell. "I am sorry," he murmured, and started to press gently on the muscle and ligaments. "I cringe to think I would be the one to afflict you such. Perhaps if I had known you would be present I would have recognized you earlier," he said, and Aragorn, who was doing his best to ignore what was being done to his arm, detected a bit of bitterness in the elf's voice.

"I don't understand how you came to be here in the first place," Aragorn said.

"I have few answers for you," Elrond replied, and considered the arm for a moment before continuing. "If anybody is to illuminate the situation, it would be Galadriel."

"Why am I not surprised?"

"Not many days ago she sent me her thoughts. She had just looked into her mirror. She told me she had seen for me a family tragedy. She said, _I have seen Erebor. I see King Thengel. I see a shadow-cloaked assassin._ That is all she had of details. I asked her what that had to do with my family, and she could not answer. I was curious – Elladan and Elrohir had recently gone west with some Rangers, Arwen is in Imladris, and the well-being of my in-laws was apparent. I had gotten word from you that you were heading west as well…" Elrond paused and glanced up at Aragorn for an explanation.

"Havhem," Aragorn said. "Havhem asked me to spread a false rumor. He said it was to ensure my own safety from the assassin, who he said would recognize me."

"And it was he who suggested your appearance be masked?"

"Yes."

"I am sure he told his men to kill the one who looked like an assassin, draped in a dark cloak and covering his face. And King Thengel would not have been the wiser."

"Yes," Aragorn said sheepishly. Havhem's requests did sound odd now, with hindsight.

"No matter," Elrond muttered, looking a bit sheepish himself for having brought more discomfort on Aragorn. "Now you know the consequences of false messages. Your foster father will try to kill you."

"Duly noted."

"We are lucky I only broke the bone once here…" Elrond said, leaning his face down to the arm and holding it firmly, as if he were listening to the bones themselves. "One solid break, but the bone is also bruised, as is the muscle and the tendon here. Please lay down, the blood will be good for your neck." Aragorn obliged, laying back across the stubble of the mountain grass. Elrond took his arm in his hands and simply held it; the sour, burning pain of the break began to ebb.

"I was concerned," Elrond said, "for the well-being of Thengel, of course, and wanted to send a party immediately. Galadriel encouraged _me_ to act upon her vision, though why she was so adamant that I and I alone went instead of someone else, she could not say. I know the variability of what the mirror shows but I could not risk non-action. From her words, I came thinking to watch for an assassin who would kill King Thengel, and I thought perhaps Thengel's death would somehow come to cause harm to one of my kin.

"When I came to the mountain and saw that there was a great feast, I thought to first check the gallery above the hall, and I saw there two assassins – or what I assumed were two assassins, though I did not see the second one – I did not see you – until I had killed the first one… who I suppose was the one Havhem sent to murder you. Of course when you gave chase I thought you were another assassin.

"When I ran into Havhem's men – I still cannot believe I committed such a mistake – they immediately attacked, as we now know they had been told to kill the cloaked one, which I was. They called out the name _Thorongil_, which I thought odd at first, until they were almost upon us in that chamber. Then I realized why Galadriel had sent me here, and for what purpose."

"I ran into those same guards not a moment after you had," mused Aragorn. "They did look perplexed."

They both fell silent, and Aragorn closed his eyes. How strange that events had worked out just so and only one had died. How strange that the one being who could have forewarned of this event happened to be the mother-in-law of his own foster father, and how wonderful that he himself was included in her mirror's perception of Elrond's kin.

"Thank you," he murmured, and his voice came out quieter than he expected. His body had started to fall into sleep without him realizing it. He opened his eyes. Elrond sat, legs crossed, at his side, still holding his arm in his lap and drawing an aura of good energy about it. The elf, in his rough clothing and nondescript braid, stared down at Aragorn with a puzzled look on his face, and it might have been the after affects of too much adrenaline but Aragorn thought he'd never forget the image. The constellations scrawled their stories across the sky behind the elf and the moon set his skin with a grey radiance.

"For bringing me out of the mountain alive," Aragorn finished.

"Despite my best efforts," said Elrond sourly.

"Are you going to ask me to follow you back to Imladris for a while?"

"What a ridiculous question, Aragorn. We both know you have more important things to be doing than loafing about in Imladris with time-crusted elves." Elrond looked away after saying this, and the meaning of his words hit Aragorn with a sudden, yet familiar, weight. "Besides which I expect Thengel will want you around for Havhem's trial."

"Trial?" Aragorn asked, his mind following a few steps behind his ears.

"Of course. Havhem and his followers will be tried for deception and murderous intentions."

"Will Thengel send him to exile?"

"I expect that is what will be determined at the trial."

"Will _all _of Havhem's men be judged?"

"I do not know, Aragorn. Now please, stop talking, I am trying to put you asleep. Your head is addled and your arm needs stillness."

"…My apologies. I do feel heavy-eyed."

"Ever the iron will," Elrond sighed with a touch of irritation, but his eyes betrayed deep fondness. Aragorn wondered for just a moment if, after tonight's incident, Elrond thought less of him. Perhaps he now doubted Aragorn's ability to assume his place in the line of kings. But he finally closed his eyes and sifted down to the base of the question and found there were no roots reaching into the waking world, and even besides that…

* * *

**A/N**: I have a confession. I almost called this story "Errorgorn and Elwrong." But that would have been a bad use of my free will, so I didn't.


	5. House of the Heart

**5: House of the Heart**

_My thoughts on the Celebrían tragedy. Yeah, it's been done before, but… I HAD TO. And I wanted to get it out of the way now so I could spend the rest of the holiday season thinking about happy things like biscuits. The POV here is shiftier than a unicycle in a pool of marbles, so keep your mind nimble. Angst lies ahead. If this story seems excessively Elrond-centric for the situation… well, that's because it is. :P _

_I prelude this with a snippet from _The Fellowship of the Ring,_ "The Ring Goes South": _

"...But the elves of this land were strange to us silvan folk, and the trees and grass do not remember them. Only I hear the stones lament them: _deep they delved us, high they builded us; but they are gone… _" -Legolas

* * *

_T.A 2510_

Gandalf and the season's moons had watched Celebrían stand back up, the work of months, had watched her scars fall away like the weary, sighing leaves of November. They had stood by as Elrond witnessed the evacuation of her heart, how her eyes fell to embers and how her pulse had begun to rock with the tides of the sea.

Celebrían had called for Gandalf in the morning one day in September. The slate clouds blew an ambitious, early chill through Imladris, and all the trees and late flowers held fast to themselves and sighed, _not yet, not yet_. The wizard drew his thick cloak about himself and took the chair next to hers. She watched him and his bones hummed. Her face was laid open, as it had been for weeks, vacant where one year ago joy had blazed.

The fair lady reached out her hand and slipped it on top of Gandalf's, and pressed her wish there against his fingers. The stone in his ring flared with yearning to revive, and though even it was helpless for her spirits, it spoke her desire and Gandalf raised his eyes to hers.

"You'll stay," she said. "Please. With your fire. Stay through the winter."

He agreed. There was nothing else he could possibly do to occupy his time this winter, especially given what she was about to do. Hours after their morning interchange, after Elrond had returned from hurried errands and prepared her midday meal of late-summer harvests, after he had asked her why her stare was so penetrating, why her smile so rare today, she said,

"I am going West."

She wore a pale green robe over dark grey and not a strand of her hair, which he had brushed and braided in the morning, had become unsettled. Not a wrinkle on her person, yet under all that, there were fissures – chasms – that had refused to seal up. Now her words hung between them like a treatise. He looked at what she'd said and drew his eyebrows together.

"I am leaving tomorrow," she continued, softly. He took a step towards her, still grappling with the words. They jammed in his mind and his thoughts stuttered. He asked his hands to draw up and rest on her shoulders but they did not respond. "Elrond… You know I am only happy anymore when you are beside me. When you leave I feel frost settle on my heart. And I know you would spend the rest of your days here holding me up, if I asked." The level horizon of her voice pinned him and he could do nothing but release his breath, which fell from between his lips and sank. "Your attention will be needed elsewhere, fervently, and soon. I will not stay and keep you for myself, and I cannot stay while you must be absent."

Weary, she was weary and felt herself grow more threadbare. Elrond saw her fingertips waver and mingle with the air and panic jumped in his chest. Something finally struggled up through the mire in his head and he opened his mouth.

"Celebrían… I will _always_ stay by your side. It is not yet time – "

"It is time," she said, cutting him off. He took another step forward and his hand twitched into life.

"But you – "

"No." He froze, stricken. She would not come forward, or meet him, save for the bitter chill of her eyes upon his. Another step towards her, more of a falter, his body confused and disconnected.

"Celebrían – "

"No."

He stopped, hand trembling within reach of her breath. He closed his eyes for careful seconds, opened them. Fear seized hold in his gut, fear more fierce than any he had known in nightmare visions or on battlefields. Her coldness sent him reeling and he could not think what to do and Gandalf, who watched from the doorway, despaired to imagine they might stay this way forever, cast like stone in their quiet, petrified turmoil.

The wizard drew air up through his pipe and released it as a slow smoky necklace, beaded with tranquility. The roots in the soil beneath his boots exhaled as well, patient, but the grass was holding its collective ephemeral breath. The grass would die when winter arrived, and its neighbors, the flowers, the sedges and rushes, would die. The vines in the gardens that now bore fruit, the wide leaves of sun-embracing herbs, would wither and fall to darken the soil. A lick on the wind hinted that winter was closer than anybody had imagined, might strike so soon that the seeds of late flowers would be sealed in the young, emaciated petals, and next spring the land would be barren.

Time only fed Elrond's fears and now he thought his wife would shatter if another moment passed in silence and stillness. Finally his hands came down gently on her shoulders. She neither flinched nor cracked, but her arms responded, and then her body, and at last she drew him into a tight embrace. His hands clasped tight together behind her shoulders as if he would lock himself to this, one of their last deep communions for many ages. Celebrían's aura became warm and she softened, holding fast. She thought of Lórien, how her mother, the ring-bearer, preserved the forest in unchanging rapture for her people. Time fled by outside of the forest, but within was maintained undying. Galadriel saw the illusion, as did Celeborn, and as did Celebrían. Galadriel could not hold the realm in stopped time forever, and Lórien would fade. On Arda, the will of things to ever churn was stronger than the magic of any elf, no matter how carefully Galadriel tended her lands, no matter how long Elrond held Celebrían in the refuge of his arms.

"Glorfindel has agreed to see me to the Grey Havens," she said.

"I will see you off," he whispered.

"You will not. We will part on the steps of Imladris."

"Why do you say this?"

"You will be stricken with the sea-longing if you come."

"Then I will be stricken."

"I forbid you your offer," she said, and through their embrace felt his chest heave in sorrow. "You will not come. Please, my love, do not fight my wish."

He blinked and grit his teeth, and could not speak to argue, though he wished to.

"Arwen will need you," she continued. "This is little notice I give you but it must be so."

"How can I stand for our daughter when…"

"You know you must, and I know you can."

Gandalf refilled his pipe. He strung more smoke trails into the wind, snatching along with a far fetch. The sky became a paler shade of grey as somewhere beyond, the sun continued to climb. All the small green things were filled with apprehension and shivered as their futures shrunk and their roots clutched at the ground. Bees and beetles moved slowly, too slowly, from blossom to blossom.

"Winter comes early," Elrond said, softly.

"I know," she sighed.

There was to be no ceremony for the departure of Celebrían. The rest of the day was spent putting small affairs in order and concluding final, menial tasks. News spread slowly like a springwater seep, but as night fell, everyone had come to hold the news and all the eyes of the valley were fixed wide upon Celebrían and her family, wondering what they would do, how this would go. This would be Celebrían's last night in Arda and Elrond wanted badly to spend it with her but knew that if he did not grieve now, tonight, alone, then he would be seized with it after her departure tomorrow. Who would Arwen hold to then? She was strong but she was young and neither Elrond nor Celebrían would risk that she draw into herself.

He asked Arwen to stay the night by Celebrían's side, and then he walked far down into the valley, taking paths that hadn't been traveled in years. It was a difficult spot to reach, but he wracked his mind and remembered which thicket to push through, which gorge to descend, and arrived finally under cover of low clouds and young hours. Here the banks of the Bruinen were steep and hung with ferns. The river cut the rock sharp and deep, rushing, ceaseless, its noisy chatter echoing between the close walls, and even in the coldest months its ice persistently cracked and groaned. Elrond wept and the pitch of his sorrow was lost in the canyon. The moss absorbed his heaving sighs, and his tears. His pacing marked grief into the very stone and then for a long while he curled around himself at the base of a gnarled hazel tree, so still and small that the boulders wondered briefly if he wished to join them in their everlasting rest.

It was not missed by Gandalf that Elrond returned only with the sun in the morning, and when the elf was finally pressed to speak, his voice was wrung and frayed. Still, something of his spirit was now fixed and steady for what was to come. The wind eddying in Gandalf's ears cried to him what had happened far away along the river, what Elrond had done, and the wizard knew that from this point on and without any discussion, that place would be avoided by all travelers. It would become known as The Hollow, not for what it was, but for what had taken place there.

Upon Celebrían's leaving, all gathered for farewells and to wish her safe passage. A full moon cycle early, the trees wept their emerald leaves in sorrow for the House of Elrond.

**-)O(-**

"Like this?" the youth asked, and brandished her serrated knife.

"Yes, but carefully," Elrond replied, and demonstrated again the proper way to cut into a gourd. "When making harvest lanterns, you must move slowly, or you risk collapsing the shell." He handed the knife back and watched carefully as the child once more stabbed into the gourd, sawing back and forth. The harvest feast was only days away, and every year the event was adorned with intricately carved harvest lanterns. It was a seasonal joy that every elf looked forward to.

Mere weeks had passed since Celebrían's departure, but frost had long since killed the vines. Elrond and Vilya had done what they could to assuage the sadness that lingered deeply in the hearts of the elves, but it was a transparent effort. To a visitor, the Lord of Imladris was holding up like a mallorn and had not abandoned any of his previous merit or grace, though it was often distressing to meet his eyes. But to the elves, who knew well both their lord and their valley, it was clear that the winter that fell upon them early and the winter that had fallen over the rest of Elrond's days in Arda were one in the same. In all the years gone by, it had happened that his mood would shift the weather in subtle ways.

Despite the promise of a long cold season, Gandalf's presence, bearing Narya unseen, fed small flames of hope and encouraged thoughts of spring in those whose hearts were frost-bitten. He kept one eye on Elrond, as he had promised Celebrían he would, but stayed at a distance. On this day, while the chill sun came down through the branches upon the children making harvest lanterns, Elrond knew Gandalf was on the balcony above, puffing as always upon his pipe, watching the proceedings.

Some of the lanterns were the creations of inexperienced hands, and were cracked, clumsily rendered, the triumphant first attempts. Some were the work of days, spangled with stars and runes. Altogether they were, as they were every year, an exultant sight. This day, Elrond was discovering that he could not bear to watch the process any longer. He stood and beckoned to another older elf to watch over the child and her creative devices.

The weeks had proven to Elrond that he was not going to fade out of grief, and that he could be the support for Arwen that she needed (and for the twins, if they ever came back from their wild riding). He made his way from the festivities and towards the winding stone stairs that would lead him to the balcony and the wizard, for whatever end. He could think of nothing to be said between them. _Perhaps that is why I go to him now_.

Gandalf, who leaned into the stone rail, merely nodded his quick, friendly nod, crescent eyes spilling mirth, and continued to puff. His grey robes were so still that the wizard seemed part of the stonework. Elrond stepped to stand next to him and look down upon the vale and its inhabitants, but after only a moment his gaze fell to his own hands.

"So, Elrond," Gandalf mused, and shifted easy to face the elf. His eyes became more serious. "You distance yourself from the revelry."

"Yes," he replied, softly and plainly. "The evisceration of the fruits of the harvest does not sit well with me this year, so to speak." A touch of humor crept into his voice but it was far overshadowed by his understatement. Gandalf nodded his understanding and observed the bowl of his pipe for a long moment before taking Elrond gently by the shoulder and drawing him from the balcony's edge. He led them slowly towards a hallway that would eventually empty into the center of the house.

"I have spoken little with you of late, my friend," Gandalf said. They both knew that their understanding of each other ran deeper than what mere spoken word would communicate, but the gesture was a warm one, and kindly. Sometimes truths preferred to surface via the ponderous work of the tongue.

"Truly," Elrond replied. "And my thanks. No doubt I would have succeeded only in confusing us both with my words."

"You speak plainly now. That is good."

Elrond didn't reply. As they drew further into the house the shadows gathered together and his robes, which Gandalf had thought to be the color of cordial in the sunlight, deepened to the hue of a heart sealed safely away in layers of darkness.

"Tell me, Elrond, how do feel?" the wizard asked. Elrond drew a breath and let it out.

"Like a harvest lantern who has had their flame snuffed and their wick removed."

At this, Gandalf took in a long breath through the pipe and sighed it out wearily. The sentiment was not unexpected yet he ached for having heard it. The hallway became darker still and the wizard almost illuminated his staff, but thought better of it. There was still light enough to see, and Elrond drew comfort from the gloom.

"You do not fade," Gandalf observed.

"I am cold," Elrond countered. "I fear that spring for me will not come until after I have sailed."

"You cannot pretend to know that. Gifted as you are, what happens within the house of the heart is unforeseeable."

"Yet I feel it as plainly as the bricks beneath my feet. In Imladris all is laid open and wound-bare. No leaves, no snow. The souls of men are challenged to overcome the emptiness." Firelight came into view now, dancing on the walls. They drew near the center of the house, the hearth room. The sight of the elf lord sitting near the fire mantle was common of late. "It is especially cruel in the blue hour after the sun has set and the arms of trees are seized against the slate of clouds." One more turn and the hearth itself came into view. Nobody else occupied the room and no torches had been lit. The fire blazed red within the iron and masonry of its crib. "Air and water are frozen," Elrond said, and stepped up to the heat. "In hideously serene existence."

"The illusion of waste land," Gandalf said.

"For the valley, yes."

"But not for you?"

"No. This is no illusion."

"Will you not see the spring when the days lengthen? Will the sun fail to warm you?"

Elrond's eyes reflected the dance of flames. A memory came to him and he held it at a length, not eager to enter fully into it. The winters in years past had been times of many councils, between the Wise, between dwarves and the elves, between the Dúnedain and Rohan, between strangers and friends and rivals. They met in Rivendell because it was a horizontal place, and everyone was given the same plane to stand and speak from. Elrond had made it thus, and he kept it thus, but keeping such peace was oftentimes taxing. Celebrían knew this and would wait in the evening here, by the fire, carving beauty into lanterns or telling stories to children while she absorbed the warmth. Elrond would come in late from the council building, and the winter would have wound its way into his robes and chilled him. She would stand and welcome him with a hug and the warmth of her body and heart would dispel all his tensions and chills.

Soft footsteps brought him back. They came from another hallway and Arwen entered, her pale skin glowing as if moonlit. She saw them, and hesitated.

"Do I interrupt?"

"No, my daughter. Join us by the fire."

Arwen, daughter of Elrond and granddaughter of Galadriel, knew that she had indeed interrupted, and could see something strung between Gandalf and Elrond. She had not witnessed her father speak deeply with the wizard since Celebrían's leaving, and as she had drawn considerable comfort from her father, she could not guess as to where he had been quelling his own worries, if he had tried. She came towards the fire, and he turned when she was near and drew her into a gentle hug.

"Ada, you are so warm," she sighed contentedly, and Gandalf watched as Elrond smiled. They suspended in the embrace for long moments. Then the two came apart and, with Gandalf in company, pulled chairs up to the light of the fire. Gandalf watched Elrond, and Arwen waited as well. An answer was waiting to be spoken, though she knew not what had been asked.

"I suppose," the elf lord said, finally, "small springs may strike unexpected. Once in a while." Gandalf nodded, and raised the spout of his pipe back to his mouth. He blew smoke rings into the fire, and they rose up with the draft into the flue. Narya blazed warmly on his finger and he watched Arwen reach slightly and take Elrond's hand, and both the elves smiled a little. They were casting their hopes to the day, perhaps hundreds of years away yet, the summer day when together they would sail West.


	6. Rabble Rouser

**6: Rabble Rouser**

_In which the High King considers the movement of air. This is probably a very OOC Elrond for some people, but if you indulge your imagination and keep in mind that he probably wasn't always so party-pooperish as he was portrayed in the LotR movies, this might make sense. Warning: Drunken people being merry. A singular curse is dropped._

* * *

_S.A 999-1000_

_Eve of Yestarë (between December and January)_

"Elrond has disappeared," Gil-galad sighed in exasperation, and pulled his woolen cloak tighter round his shoulders. "That he had chosen to spend the night walking in your company, master shipwright, was my last hope."

"Why do you seek him?" Círdan said. The freezing wind was rough, and here on the shores of the Grey Havens the fetch was long and the old elf's silver hair whipped around his shoulders like a thing from the deep and brackish waters of Belegaer. Moonlight skipped across the tops of waves and splashed dimly across the glaze of ice on the boards of the docks.

"When we have need for discussion, we often speak beneath the stars," Gil-galad replied, than added, with a touch of bitterness, "…it is the only time we can almost be assured not to have scheduling conflicts. There is a matter to be discussed between us that has been heavy upon my conscience for too long now. I have searched all his usual nighttime haunts. I suppose I will call to his mind, then."

"No, do not. I would suggest, Ereinion," Círdan said, turning his back on the sea and towards the city, "that you take a walk instead, down through the South district."

"The South district? Why?" The South district of Mithlond had become, over the years, a sort of haven for Men – soldiers and warriors and travelers alike – who had reason to stay in Mithlond for any period of time. While Elrond found the customs and habits of Men fascinating, as he found the customs and habits of any race fascinating, Gil-galad could not guess as to why he would have chosen tonight to spend his time in the loud, the raucous, the wild and hearty relative wilderness within the city limits.

"This is the night of Mettarë," Círdan said. "Tomorrow is Yestarë."

"Ah." Gil-galad had known that, somewhere in the more abandoned recesses of his mind. The Númenóreans were in the midst of the two yearless days, those that came after the last day of the previous year and before the first of the new year. The elvish new year was in the spring, and Gil-galad rarely remembered the holidays of Men. It was easy to forget, here in Mithlond. He imagined that tonight all the sea people and travelers had congregated to the South district to celebrate together, though they were away from their homelands. "Elrond celebrates with the Men tonight, does he?" Gil-galad mused. He'd noticed that although Elrond had chosen the path of immortality, still he seemed to engage once in a while with the Man blood in his veins. "Perhaps I will not bother him then."

"No no," insisted Círdan. "Go to the South district." The shipwright had acquired that sly look in his eyes that always put Gil-galad on his guard. Gil-galad watched him for a moment, hoping for some further clue, cryptic or not, but none were forthcoming.

"It would not be worth it to ask you why, I assume."

"You may not have the discussion you had hoped for with young Elrond… but I have the feeling that a little stroll down to the district will quell any doubts you may have in your head."

"How in the name of…" Gil-galad started, but shut his mouth. _How in the name of Ulmo can you possibly know what it was I wished to discuss,_ he was going to ask, because somehow, despite having been virtually raised by the shipwright, Gil-galad was still in everlasting awe of Círdan's mind. "Nevermind," he finished. Círdan smiled benevolently, as if he were completely unaware of the fact that he was making the king trip over his own thoughts. "Alright. My thanks for your advice." Gil-galad turned and headed towards the junction of the wheelpath and the street that would lead him to the South district.

"Keep your ears open," Círdan called after him, one last piece of perplexity to add to the situation.

In from the docks and striking out down the path between the empty market stalls, Gil-galad let out a breath. His nighttime plans had changed. Perhaps it was all for the better. Gil-galad was rarely unsure of himself, and he had been very unsure of what he had been planning on telling, or asking, Elrond. He had been mulling over the issue for months now; he supposed it had been stewing in his mind for years, perhaps, in the subconscious bog that lay beneath his waking mind. He had been listening to the words and thoughts of the wise – Círdan, Celeborn, and Galadriel, who had come from Eregion. Gil-galad had sat in on the discussions, and though he had not yet the foresight to add to what was being said, he had the responsibility of kingship to care deeply that something ill and dark had begun to obscure the far east, down across the Hithaeglir range and inland from the mouth of the Anduin, in the shadows and fires of the land called Mordor.

Gil-galad had then become painfully aware of the vulnerability of Lindon. They could hold their own against considerable forces of whatever direction or race, if need be, but something in the tone that the wise ones were using told Gil-galad that the darkness that they feared was forming would be able to muster more than a considerable force. Perhaps it was his own paranoia, but Gil-galad resolved to perfect the strength of his reach, the support of Lindon's friends, and generally render his people ready for just about anything.

He could not do this alone, especially if what they feared came to pass. There were few who he could see himself trusting completely to carry out his wishes and to advise him with unsparing frankness and wisdom. Such a position would also indubitably bring great danger upon whoever was chosen. Gil-galad could not, then, decide if it was good fortune or ill fate that the few people he would categorize as possibly up to the task were also great friends of his.

Thus it came that Ereinion Gil-galad had on a whim chosen tonight to broach the subject with Elrond, and thus it was that he now ventured into the South district, quite unsure of things indeed. Elrond seemed a natural choice but Elrond had not yet been in a commanding position in any sizeable battles. The elf could spar, that much had been made clear, and could heal, and could study and memorize – Gil-galad could not ask for a more well-learned advisor. But the strength of an army, in a very large part, depended on the strength of those who commanded it. That was a significant worry, but through that came the much smaller but much sharper ethical question of whether or not Gil-galad could bring his friend so directly into the path of danger, where he himself would no doubt be positioned, possibly not far into the future.

Gil-galad hated being uncertain about things, which now served to fringe the edges of his thoughts with frustration. He walked more quickly down the frosted cobbled streets, beneath graceful, grey stone arches and vaulted domes that were wreathed in glory flowers in the summer and fall, but now wore the vines obscured under robes of snow. Further along the street, the architecture began to change to reflect the minds of the architects. The South district had been designed by Men and for Men, and it showed. No less grand of scale and ideas, but the stone was rougher in cut, more persistent in demeanor, and darker. The bricks had been quarried, shaped, and moved to location, instead of carved from the rock, like much of the rest of Mithlond was.

There was an obvious rumpus to be heard down near the heart of the district, and Gil-galad grudgingly pricked his ears, as Círdan had advised, to follow the noise. _Every Man in Mithlond must be in the same place tonight_, thought Gil-galad, as the streets appeared to be deserted. _Every Man and a handful of rabble-rousing elves_. _Elrond cannot be the only one._ The torches in the street danced and the air was so crisp that Gil-galad felt as if he were moving through a plane of perfect frozen water, and that he might shatter it if he breathed too deep. If the air was nippy for him, he could not imagine what it felt like against the skin of Men. _A pity it is so cold tonight for the festivities_, he mused, and drew his hood up over his head, but as he came closer to the heart of the district he began to realize that the men were not minding the temperatures; not in the least.

There was a tavern in the center of the district that had been given the uninspired name of The Haven by the owner, and its size had always seemed to Gil-galad to be of overly hopeful proportion. Now, tonight, the space had been filled to the brink. Gil-galad came to the edge of a wheelpath intersection and looked across the wide street and through the picture windows of The Haven. Every one of the tables was full, every stool at the counter was occupied, and it was quite possible that every stein and flagon was being enthusiastically employed. None of the chill of the outdoors had managed to seep into the tavern, what with the press of warm bodies and so much movement. Most of the visitors had thrown off cloaks and surcoats and now sat about or tripped to the bar in their tunics and jerkins.

Forgetting for a moment his heavy thoughts, Gil-galad took a moment to appreciate the unique nature of Men. Elves could have their festivities, and could raise their own riots and revelries with little effort. With the Children of Arda who had been given the Gift, however, festivities seemed heightened into a sort of trance-like celebration of raw, pure hilarity and the complete abandonment of inhibition. No doubt the qualities of such revelry had a direct correlation with whether or not the members of the party were mortal or immortal, and no doubt Elrond would have something wise to say about it, but Gil-galad was not up to such pondering tonight.

He was not sure _what _it was he was going to do tonight, and this further uncertainty brought him more chagrin. Círdan, whose word he trusted, had told him to come down to the Second district, and not call for Elrond's mind. Gil-galad had come. Círdan had told him to follow his ears; he had, and now stood in front of The Haven. Was Elrond in the tavern? Gil-galad blinked at the yellow light coming from within and thought about making a grand entrance, finding his friend, publicly humiliating Elrond for the fun of it, and dragging the half-elf back out into the cold so he could be quizzed on his feelings about leading massive armies. Gil-galad smiled and immediately dismissed the whimsy of a thought. If ever he were to do such a thing, tonight would not be the night. What he wished to discuss with Elrond hinged on the good relationship the two of them had developed over the years, and to risk putting Elrond off in any way would be to risk the outcome of their conversation.

"Long night for them bartenders," said a voice across the street, and Gil-galad turned to see an old man slouching towards him across the cobbles, leaning heavily upon a cane; the only man he'd seen this night not under cover of the tavern. "You an elf?"

"Yes," said Gil-galad, bemused.

"Sure are tall," the man said, and drew up within a few steps of Gil-galad, and turned to face the windows of The Haven. Either Gil-galad was tall or the man was exceptionally short, or perhaps his spine had telescoped with age. The man was swathed in a thick fur cloak and his white hair flowed out from under the ruff in a copious manner. He did not recognize Gil-galad, either because the king was wearing a hooded cloak or the man's eyesight was poor due to cataracts and overly bushy eyebrows.

"I'd be in there," the man continued, and gestured, "but sure as they call me Old Rondo, I'd be knocked over in a pinch. I'm too old for that these days. Rowdy young folks." Despite his words, Old Rondo watched through the picture window with what Gil-galad suspected might have been nostalgia. Gil-galad followed his gaze.

The noise in The Haven grew suddenly full of excited voices that could not be pulled apart to form anything coherent. Much counter-slapping and abstract yelling came to the two of them, and eventually there was a vibrating lull in the ruckus, and one voice gurgled forth.

_"Midnight! It's midnight! Who's up for _Mackney Grange_?"_

The quiet was broken as shouts of affirmation billowed forth, casting all semblance of a lull aside.

"Ha. _Mackney Grange_," Old Rondo chuckled. The men in the tavern were gearing up for a song, and had started a rhythm going by pounding fist and flagon across the table planks. "I remember when I could belt it out with the best of 'em."

Gil-galad's previous anger and frustration was melting away like ice on a griddle. The tavern was a ruckus of counter-pounding, mug-toasting, foot-stomping noise, the air full of the gravel shouts of drunken and merry men – and a handful of elves. A sort of unified heartbeat was starting to become audible, though a rough one, and punctuated by a few grace notes and trips by the less musically-inclined. It was enough sound to deafen a troll, yet somehow, when the song began, one voice still sailed above the rest of the din with bizarre ease. It was not a higher pitch that set it apart, nor was it that the singer had used artificial means to augment his voice. It was simply _louder_.

_"Ildagard Grange was a lovely maid, made her_

_home with her father in the Ettenmoor Range, gave her_

_heart and her hands to the Keeper's son – but the_

_trolls of the Fells, they would spare no one."_

The melody was not a simple one, and the syllables were not written to spill forth gracefully from the singer; they sounded more like they were written to twist the singers' tongues in knots. Old Rondo's right foot was now tapping along merrily, and the man was mumbling inaudibly, trying to remember the words and sing along. Gil-galad was sure he never would have been able to tell what was being sung were it not for the loudest singer, who was having no trouble spitting out each word in stride.

_"They came in the dark, four trolls with their clubs, and their_

_roars shook the walls, put the chill in the blood of the_

_Keeper's son and Ildagard Grange, and the_

_trolls killed the two from the Ettenmoor Range._

_The beasts went north and the Keeper wept, and the_

_Keep of the Forochel Fjords was unkept, but the_

_late maid's father made a vow that he'd drive four_

_heads of the Troll Fells Lords to the sky._

_Mackney Grange of the Ettenmoor Range! The_

_blade-swingin' bloke with a flint in his brain swore to_

_snatch four heads from the Trollfells Lords, hang 'em _

_pretty 'top the Keep of the Forochel Fjords!..."_

Gil-galad had gotten a funny sensation about the lead singer, and now started across the street to peer into the window. Old Rondo gamely followed, looking through the windows to his side. The pace of the song had been gradually picking up, and the pounding on the tables had become livelier. He could see a great many smiles inside as men lost much of the brews in their vessels to their table-pounding enthusiasm. A few of the more inebriated of the men had given up singing and now only laughed along. Some of them were still trying to sing but their alcohol-tainted tongues moved too slowly for them to be comprehensible.

Again, there was that one clear singer. Gil-galad put his face to the glass and was only mildly astonished to find that, upon tracking the noise, the owner of the voice was none other than Elrond.

The half-elf's resonant voice was magnified by some means Gil-galad could not see or understand, but it might have been a simple matter of air. Elrond was simply shifting an enormous amount of it, much more than anybody else was, and he was making it look easy. The faces of the other singers strained happily in an effort to make as much noise as possible, but Elrond looked as if the task were as easy as throwing together a cup of chamomile tea. Not only was Elrond getting the words out, but he was also giving the verses the respect they required in order to be rendered into a story. Most of the men were struggling enough with simply remembering the words, while Elrond was almost making Gil-galad care about whether or not Mackney Grange would catch the last troll, which was saying something, as Gil-galad had always felt nothing but passive disinterest for crude tales that were woven for the sole purposes of making noise.

"…_One head left and three in the sack, Mackney_

_tracked the last beast up north and back, 'till the _

_Troll Lord tired of the chase and turned, and _

_hit Mackney Grange with a two-toned roar!_

_He faced with a legend, here a two-headed troll, called an_

_Ettin by the ancient and the scripts of old. Mackney_

_ran round the troll, quick as silver in the hand, set the _

_troll's two heads all a-spin, then the damn beast_

_fell to the ground with his four eyes reelin', Mackney's_

_black stone blade set the left head spinnin' from its _

_seat by the other, and the Ettin Lord rose but was _

_cut down cold by the Ettenmoor's blow!_

_Mackney Grange of the Ettenmoor Range! The_

_blade-swingin' brawler with a flint in his brain, he _

_snatched five heads from the Trollfells Lords, hung 'em_

_pretty 'top the Keep of the Forochel Fjords!"_

By the time the song had ended, the pace had picked up to such a rhythm that only a handful of singers still attempted to get the words out. Everyone else had simply banged louder on the tables to accommodate for their lack of vocal support. Now Old Rondo clapped merrily and let out a string of chuckles.

"That elf's one humdinger of a tank, there," he wheezed. "Most people can't even sing it that fast when they're _sober_. Whew." Gil-galad momentarily lost sight of his friend in the tavern as the elf was obscured by a congratulatory, back-slapping crowd of cheering men.

"Is that song some sort of test?"

"Oh yes, master elf, yes it is! You sing it at midnight to see who's holding onto their drinks the best! Mighty entertaining, I tell you, mighty entertaining." He dissolved once again into a fit of merriment and continued to watch the antics beyond the smudged and slumping pane of glass. Gil-galad's eyes looked on as well, but he had drawn inward.

He had known that Elrond could sing but he had had no idea that Elrond was such a formidable airbag. The elf had had no problem being heard in this, the loudest of conditions, and under duress of alcohol to boot. Elrond had had the spirit and courage to take part in such festivities in relatively strange company, and the wits to remember the words, hit the notes, and smile whilst not tripping over his own tongue. To be able to earn the attention and admiration of a tavern full of inebriated men was not the same as earning the attention and trust of a legion, but still Gil-galad saw a connection.

He would not interrupt Elrond from his celebrations, ridiculous though they may be. Gil-galad refused to wonder how Círdan had known to direct him here with open ears, and the event certainly hadn't dismissed every one of his doubts and worries, but it was a very solid push towards assurance.

"Blasted barnacles but it's cold," shivered the old man, and tore his eyes from the revelry going on inside to aim his smile up at Gil-galad. "If I may, what's an elf doing around these parts on such a night, watching your friends and standing out in the chill to freeze?"

"I came to learn a thing or two about someone, I suppose." The old man raised one of his caterpillar-like eyebrows in puzzlement, and Gil-galad gave a slight bow to excuse himself, not wishing to have to deny an explanation to this merry old sailor. "Good Yestarë to you," he said, and turned to cross the street, towards the wheelpath. The old man raised a hand in farewell and grunted in goodbye before pausing, considering the tavern door, and then lugging himself forward on his cane to enter The Haven.

* * *

_A/N:_ _Thanks for reading. Do have a (reasonably) safe and unequivocally merry turn of the year! _


	7. Flour Power

**7: Flour Power**

_Today I had a face-off with a cabbage and ended up loosing a teaspoon of my thumb, which I thought was pretty funny, which reminded me that I've been meaning to write a fic that includes cooking, and also one that involves beyond-canon humor. (I think Tolkien's elves had way more of a sense of humor than they are sometimes granted. Even within the canon.) So I sat down to type out a cooking/comedy story about Elrond and Gil-galad, and here it is. Created with nine fingers. Hell yeah. _

_There are a few mild curses in this one._

* * *

_S.A 1,402_

"Did you hear what he said?" Gil-galad asked, pacing along the meeting room table. "Did you _note _what that Sindar said about Galadriel and Celeborn?"

"Yes, my king, I noted what Oropher said," Elrond said, keeping his voice even.

"Why did he even come here? Why did he travel all the way from Emyn Duir just to tell us he had no concern for what happens in Eregion?"

"You asked him to come. It was considerate that he came to tell you of his lack of concern in person. He could easily have sent word with a pigeon."

A knock on the door made both Gil-galad and Elrond turn – Gil-galad from his pacing, Elrond from where he had sunk deeply into one of the stiff-backed chairs.

"Yes, come in," Gil-galad called. The door opened and an elf poked his head through. Elrond recognized him from training; a new recruit into their ranks, named Valto. Círdan had long ago introduced Elrond to Valto, when the lad had been much younger, and many centuries had passed before their paths had once again crossed. The dark-haired elf had more energy than the rest of the recruits combined, and Elrond thought that his left eye bugged out in a slightly unnatural manner, though he hadn't confirmed because he did not want to stare.

"Young Valto," Gil-galad said, and nodded to the elf. "What brings you here?"

"Actually I'm only five-hundred years younger than Lord Elrond, your kingship."

"Just Elrond, please," said Elrond, who was trying to discourage the widespread use of the inaccurate epithet 'lord' before his name.

"Oh. My apologies…"

"He likes to be called 'Elrond, Thane of the East Wing of the Second Floor Hall in the House of Gil-galad'," interjected the king. Elrond put on his best glare and aimed it up at his superior.

"I understand," Valto said. "Elrond, Thane of the East Wing of _which_ floor?"

"The Second Floor," said Gil-galad, somehow staving off a smile.

"Elrond, Thane of the East Wing of the Second Floor Hall in the House of Gil-galad," repeated Valto, and looked to Elrond for confirmation. Elrond squinted one eye, deciding it would likely be easier to allow the epithet to be used than to try to match wits with the mischievous Gil-galad.

"Just… 'Thane Elrond'."

"Thank you, Thane Elrond."

"Now, young Valto, what is it that brought you here?" asked Gil-galad again.

"Just Valto is fine. I saw King Oropher walking towards the guest quarters and he looked quite incised, so I asked him what was the matter, and he informed me that his meeting with the King Gil-galad and the Lord… I mean… well, he _said_ 'Lord Elrond'… had not gone very well."

"Is that so?" asked Gil-galad, sharing a look with Elrond. Any elf who had the guts to approach an angry Oropher was either wildly courageous or touched in the head. Elrond suspected the latter. "Did he say why it had not gone very well?"

"Yes, your kingship, he said – and forgive my repeating his words – he said, _Gil-galad's ears are stopped with pride and his damned half-elf advisor can't get a word of reason in edgewise._"

"Is that so?" Gil-galad asked, glancing at Elrond again, who raised his eyebrows.

"Yes, your kingship."

"And you came here to tell us that?"

"Actually I came here out of curiosity… May I ask what it is you were discussing with King Oropher?"

At this, Gil-galad let out a snort of mirth, and turned back to the meeting table, which was scattered with letters, maps, trade agreements, and political statements.

"Believe me, Valto, when I say that it would be of little interest to you. The Sinda and I… and my damned half-elf advisor… were only discussing the departure of Galadriel and Celeborn for Laurelindorenan."

"Do you not approve of their having left, your kingship?"

"What the Lord and Lady choose to do is their own business. They are very wise – far wiser than I ever hope to become. It is what they have left behind that I have concern over."

"Eregion?"

"Yes," sighed Gil-galad, staring down at the map with a wistful expression. "Eregion and Celebrimbor and that upstart Annatar." The king continued to look at the map for a moment. Elrond steepled his fingers in front of his face, leaning on the table, and Valto watched one of the trade agreements with great interest.

"Oropher thinks the Lord and Lady have done great harm to Eriador by leaving," Gil-galad said, finally, as if to himself. "But how can he assume to know the reasons for their actions?"

"Gil-galad," said Elrond, "_nobody _can assume to know the reasons for _anybody's _actions, least of all those with such wisdom. Oropher has wisdom as well."

"And I do not?"

"Of course you do, which is not the only trait you share with Oropher. You do not listen very well to those you do not respect."

"Why do you think I do not grant him much respect? He called you a damned half-elf, do not tell me _you _hold him in high regard," Gil-galad said, incredulous.

"I would not invite him to a dinner party, but still I would consider his words in an objective manner before tossing them out the window."

"He would sooner toss _you _out the window than heed your advice."

"Though he seems to think I had something relevant to say," Elrond replied, smirking, "that I could not manage to squeeze in between his bull-headed refusal to move forward and your narrow-mindedness."

"Are you two married?" asked Valto, who had up to this point been listening with great interest. Now Elrond and Gil-galad turned in tandem to face the elf, looking for a smile on his lips that would betray the humor behind his question. Elrond could see none.

"Young Valto, are you inebriated?" Gil-galad asked.

"Not at all, your kingship."

"Are you trying to be funny?"

"No, your kingship," answered Valto, a look of concern passing across his features. "I did not mean anything by it, I merely wondered if either your kingship or your thaneship had wives to return to after such a stressful meeting."

Elrond placed his face in his hands, wondering how in the world a citizen of Lindon had not been aware of the marital status of his own king, and listened resignedly as Gil-galad started to laugh. It was going to be a long laugh, he could already tell, and it was not a moment later that Valto seemed to understand what he had accidentally inferred, and started to laugh as well. Gil-galad clapped his advisor on the back and wiped a hand across his tearing eyes.

"Come, Thane Elrond, give us a smile. No, Valto, neither of us have been bound up in marital affairs yet. Perhaps some day. You know what they say about us late-marrying types."

"What do they say, your kingship?"

"The fates have something special in store for us, is what they say. Are you married, Valto?"

"Yes, your kingship. My wife Malinahen and I will celebrate our one-thousand-and-fifth anniversary this autumn."

"Well congratulations, and I'm sure the fates have special things in store for you normal types as well."

"I can only hope so, your kingship."

"What does your Malinahen do while you train with the other warriors?"

"She cooks, your kingship. It was cooking that drew us together in the first place."

"Do tell," said Gil-galad, with genuine interest, and Elrond marveled that the king could so quickly leave his ire from the meeting in favor of the ordinary delights of life as it happened in Lindon.

"I was baking for the mariners at the time," Valto said. "You know, for their rations. Traveling back and forth from Númenór. They had not quite gotten their crops established over there yet. She said it was not often that she met an elf who made better biscuits than her mother."

"So this is the secret to finding a lifemate, eh?" asked Gil-galad. "Kitchen wisdom. Say, Valto, what are you doing tonight?"

–**)O(– **

"There are two kinds of biscuits," stated Valto, his furrowed eyebrows telling Elrond and Gil-galad just how serious it was to be aware of said biscuit types. "Fluffy and flaky."

Valto turned and began pulling out a variety of ceramic jars from the kitchen cupboards. Gil-galad had convinced Valto that he and Elrond needed a baking lesson, and it had not taken much for Valto to oblige. The elf's levels of enthusiasm and energy had escalated as they neared the kitchen. As much energy as Valto had shown on the training field, he had even more in the presence of a baking kiln and cutting boards.

"All in the flour," said Valto, and lined several jars up next to each other before taking their lids off. "Fluffy biscuits need fluffy flour. Flaky biscuits need stronger flour."

"What do you mean, strong flour?" asked Elrond.

"Made from grain that is sown in the fall and harvested in the spring. It will have more _oomph_."

"Oomph."

"Yes!" exclaimed Valto, smiling, clearly in his element. "Flour that is milled from grain that is sown in the spring will be more delicate. Less oomph. Most bakers don't even know that. You are already at an advantage."

"Noted," said Gil-galad, leaning over to take a closer look at the flours. "What else?"

"The other important thing is fat. Butter has better flavor but lard gives a better texture. For the flaky type, use two parts butter to one part lard."

"What about the fluffy type?" asked Elrond.

"You know, in my honest opinion," said Valto, lowering his voice and leaning close, "don't bother with the fluffy type. Malinahen never said she was impressed with the fluffy type."

"Oh."

Their lesson continued in a similar fashion; Valto explained with much patience to his neophyte superiors the proper techniques to be employed in the process of combining the flour and fat, the right touch in stirring the liquid so as not to 'inordinately irritate the dough', and how to wedge the dough before rolling it so that it would rise in the oven to reach an impressively lofty stature.

Elrond and Gil-galad were pulling out the baking stones as Valto began to cut circles in the flattened sheet of dough, and there had been a rare moment of silence, which apparently Valto was not about to let stretch on any longer.

"What," Valto asked, concealing a smile, "is the difference… between bread and the Star of Eärendil?"

Gil-galad and Elrond paused in their efforts and stared at him, and then at each other. Elrond wasn't sure he had ever seen Gil-galad look quite as taken aback as he did at this moment. Valto could not contain his smile.

"Eärendil rises in the east," he said, "and bread rises in the yeast. Get it?" he said, and cut out the last of the circles with a chuckle. "Not that biscuits contain yeast," he finished seriously.

"Do you realize who you are speaking to?" asked Gil-galad, voicing a question that had begun to form in Elrond's mind. Valto looked up, clearly puzzled.

"Yes, of course. King Gil-galad and Thane Elrond."

"Thane Elrond," Gil-galad said, "Son of Eärendil the Dragon-Slayer." Valto merely smiled and nodded, missing the king's point. Gil-galad continued: "You would joke about the Star of Eärendil before Eärendil's own son? You tactless imp."

Valto's smile faltered.

"I like you," Gil-galad said decisively, and clamped a hand on Valto's shoulder. "You have spirit. Much spirit."

"Thank you, your kingship, but I did not mean to offend…"

"No offense taken, Valto," Elrond said. "My father is smiling."

Valto's relief at Elrond's assurance was evident. After placing the circles of soon-to-be biscuits on the baking slabs, and explaining in detail the mathematics behind their precise spacing, Valto excused himself for a moment to fetch an old cookbook that he had a fondness for that was being kept in the library, as he wished to show them an old recipe recorded by the earliest bakers of the First Age and transcribed by Malinahen's mother herself. After he'd left the room, the air seemed comparatively devoid of energy. Elrond leaned against the slab counter.

"Wow," was all Elrond could say.

"Where did he come from again?" asked Gil-galad, sitting himself down on a counter stool.

"Círdan," Elrond replied. "Remember, did not Círdan find him after the War of Wrath? A very small child. I believe his parents perished before the first year of our age. Círdan thinks Valto was hit in the head at some point during the destruction of Beleriand."

"I can believe it."

"He is a little odd, but he shows much promise during training."

"Yes, and much promise in the kitchens as well. I'd invite _him_ to a dinner party," Gil-galad said. Elrond heard an idea forming in the voice of his king, and turned to face him.

"You are plotting."

"I am _strategizing_. No doubt our warriors will be spending many a day and night traipsing about north and south across the country in the ensuing years."

"Probably."

"We will need a cook."

Elrond smiled, and nodded. He'd forgotten about that part of their schematic strategy; thankfully fortune had led them on this night to a likely solution. To have to cook for legions of men would take a lot of energy and enthusiasm, and nobody else Elrond knew fit that description so well. Elrond opened his mouth to ask Gil-galad whether he really wanted a cook that might insist on bringing eight different kinds of flours along into battle, but the king was staring most seriously at the scraps of dough left out on the counter, and Elrond hesitated.

At that moment Valto sprung into the room with a large book clenched to his chest. Before the elf could regale them with the ancient wisdom of long-dead bakers, Gil-galad held up his hand.

"Valto, why are biscuits circular?"

"… I do not know, your kingship."

"I think they should be triangular. There would be no dough left over after cutting them all up."

Elrond watched as Valto's eyes widened at the possibilities that this new suggestion presented. Valto remarked that he would have to share this idea with the one who had taught him all of the biscuit secrets in the first place. Elrond asked him who that had been and Valto replied that it had been Círdan, of course.

Thirteen minutes later, Elrond and Gil-galad were enjoying surely the best biscuits either of them had ever tasted. Valto said they were fine enough but had acquired a bit of a sour edge, and wondered if perhaps the buttermilk had turned. Elrond assured him that he, at least, could detect no sourness, which set Valto's mind to rest on the issue, and instead set himself to wondering if King Oropher might be brought into a better mood with the offering of a plate of biscuits.

Elrond and Gil-galad, done letting the strange elf's constantly surprising behavior astonish them, said nothing to dissuade him.

"I think Valto might be fearless," Gil-galad said, as the baker whisked out of the room bearing the product of their conjoined efforts.

"Brain-addled," Elrond responded.

"Let's ask him to come along on the next operation."

"Agreed."

* * *

**A/N:** Sixteen times cutsier than my usual writing; I'll probably look back on this and gag. I must be getting sick. FYI, I don't think Oropher is as much of a nincompoop as they're making him out to be. He's just having a bad day.


	8. Mad

**8: Mad**

_Gil-galad is furious. Elrond is speechless. Rated T for violence and really bad people. Themes border on M. _

_**A/N:** I'm pretty sure you can't really just pour oil on something and then expect that it'll turn into an inferno the second a match glances in its direction, but I know in the movies the warning beacons of Gondor are lit by spilling oil on the wood and lighting it on fire, and also that Denethor intended on making a flambé of himself and his son by pouring oil on the two of them and lighting up. So, scientifically accurate or not, just pretend that oil is super duper flammable._

* * *

_S.A, early_

"My king," said the judge Handë, softly, and the echo of his voice was tremulous and timid against the sharp masonry of the court, and against the eyes of Gil-galad. "To ask us not to sentence the perpetrator seems… counterintuitive."

"Let it be known," Gil-galad intoned, voice flat, "by _all_ those concerned and affected, that the criminal has been brought to justice, and is no longer a threat."

_Perhaps beyond justice,_ Elrond thought to himself. He sat at Gil-galad's side as an advisor now, but as he'd been part of said justice, he thought it was far from his place to stand up and argue – though none of it had been his idea. Also he did not quite feel up to standing. He had several days of healing ahead of him.

"My lord, the law you yourself sanctioned at the founding of the Grey Havens would have him tried for his atrocities," countered Handë.

"That is the law of the books," sighed Gil-galad. "In this instance the law of _true_ justice asks us to pass the books and listen to the case. Understand the consequences of following such pedantic acts."

"My lord – "

"Oh, do drop it, Handë. I see no conviction in your eyes. You're arguing because it's your duty and I find that quite admirable, but an elf who follows the letter of one book will let many unjust things slip past their gates."

Handë bowed his head to consider the dark, marbled floor for a moment. Elrond and the three other advisors watched him closely, grateful the decision was not in their own hands. The judge had been given little hard evidence upon which to base his decision. Gil-galad's stony glare was riveted to the far window, where morning light was streaking through stained glass and reminding them that people would be knocking on their doors very soon, desperate to know if the culprit had been secured, what their fate had been.

Gil-galad had charged Elrond with being the crier on this particular occasion, because Elrond had been the only other one there when it had happened. He would have to lie through his teeth to all of the citizens of the Grey Havens, and lie well. If any hint of doubt made it through to the people, their suspicion would take root and along with it their fear, and of all the counterintuitive things that had happened in the past handful of hours, _that_ would have been the worst, the most irreversible, the most shameful of them all.

**- ) O ( - Previous night, after sunset - ) O ( -**

"Elrond!"

Elrond's nerves nearly split themselves in surprise. He'd _told_ Gil-galad he was going to meditate. He wasn't entirely shocked that the king would choose precisely the moment Elrond had begun to slip into a comfortable, timeless daze while gazing upon the newly-lit beam staring from the ancient lighthouse out on the cape to summon him so loudly, but still, the irritation was –

"Elrond, for mercy's sake, _come!_" Something in the king's tone dismissed Elrond's annoyances, and before the half-elf had managed to get his own legs back under himself the king had lunged forward, grabbed up the back of his jerkin, brought him to his feet, and was dragging him out to the hallway like they were late for a meeting with Manwë himself. Elrond found his footing and disattached himself to mark the king's rapid pace, but hardly had he opened his mouth in question when Gil-galad answered.

"The merchant docks," the king said tersely. "All of them. All the ships, with all the families."

Anger clawed its way out from somewhere within Elrond and seated itself savagely atop his heart before he was able to fully process Gil-galad's words. He understood within the second, though, and made no attempt to dislodge his own rage as they wheeled around the corner of the hallway and headed towards the stairs.

"Círdan is unharmed," the king continued. "He is leading rescue and damage control. The fires blaze as I speak but he and the others will take care of it." Elrond almost had to jog to keep up with Gil-galad, and now, despite having to see through his own sudden red emotion, he could tell that Gil-galad was as angry as Elrond had ever seen him, a smoldering heat bearing him forward and driving his very movements and words. "You and I," Gil-galad said, as they started down the staircase, "are going to find this man tonight. This was his last act."

"How will we know where to start looking? He could be _anywhere _in the Havens by now. He could have _left_ the Havens. He has proven himself elusive. Last time he struck, half your legion came up with not a hair from his head."

"He lit the beacon of the Merchant Guild's flagship before setting the fleet on fire. The significance of such a gesture has been mostly lost in time, but Círdan has enlightened me."

"I'm afraid I don't understand," said Elrond, barely keeping his breath. Now they plunged out into the open of the night and under a brilliant map of stars, and Elrond caught a whiff of smoke coming in on the western breeze.

"The flagship only lights their own beacon when they wish for the lighthouse beacon to respond."

"But our lighthouse's beacon is _always_ burning."

"Yes, the new one out at the mouth of the bay. Somebody has lit the old brick lighthouse, the one built on the last remnants of Beleriand. The one that hasn't signaled in over two hundred years."

With a start, Elrond realized that he'd been meditating upon the sight of the old lighthouse's beacon without having realized that it wasn't supposed to be lit in the first place.

"You think he has lit the old lighthouse?" he asked, casting his gaze out across the shallow bay towards the ancient structure that now stared dimly, unblinking. "You think we will find him there?"

"I know we will."

"This night, of all the nights he has acted, he leaves such a sign… I assume you have the lighthouse surrounded, have you also sent a host – "

"I have told nobody of our criminal's location."

Elrond could not think of what to say in response to this, and instead threw his king an incredulous look. Gil-galad steered them towards the reserve stables and heaved a great sigh.

"This night he has taken the lives of merchants, both your brother's people and my own. Innocent lives. Many of them. Mothers, fathers, children. Círdan came to me weeping, holding the blackened body of a young lad. The man left a sign because he wants to be found. We don't need an entire legion to accost one individual."

"Why do you bring me, then, if you are confident you can find him? I feel compelled to go to the docks, they must need medical aid – "

"No, you come with me tonight, Elrond," Gil-galad muttered, as they wheeled around the edge of the stables and entered into the musky shadows. "When I find him, I need someone around to make sure I don't kill him on the spot. It would be better if he were judged before the court. Do you understand me?" he asked, riveting Elrond through with his gaze. Though Elrond was taken aback by the sudden request, he nodded and brushed his hand over his heart for sincerity's sake.

They swung up onto the first two beasts that came forward in their stalls to meet them. Gil-galad did not pause to gear the horses with leather shoes; the noise upon the cobbles as they took off down the sleeping streets was harsh as hail.

Gil-galad was very wise; of this Elrond was sure, as had been evidenced by the time he'd spent so far under the Noldor's rule. A bit of paranoia told Elrond that the lighthouse might be a trap, or that it was merely a distraction so that the man could once again make his escape, but the king and his steed flew faster under a swift confidence, and Elrond's trust bade him follow without further question. They rode west along the Lhûn and Elrond saw that a bank of roiling clouds was coming in with the wind, blotting out the stars.

His hair tangled behind him and his robes whipped and snapped; he was not dressed for a high-speed ride. He didn't even have a weapon, as he'd removed his hunting dagger before sitting down to meditate. They'd never been able to catch a glimpse of the man behind the recent arsons and Elrond didn't know how worried he should be about needing to defend himself, but from the way it sounded, Gil-galad thought he himself would be able to handle the situation. At least the king had his sword. A dagger was also buckled to Gil-galad's belt.

The ancient lighthouse crouched far out on a slowly collapsing cape down the firth of Lhûn. The wind was westerly and the fetch was long coming up the firth; as they came to the end of the promontory, the quiet thunder of young waves pounded out the battery clatter of hooves upon stone and they were sprayed with a fine, brackish mist. Elrond had figured that upon dismounting they might have had a brief discussion about their next actions but hardly had Gil-galad's feet hit the ground before he'd turned and stormed up over desiccated barnacles onto the ruined foundation, and put his hand out for the entry door.

"_Gil-galad_," Elrond hissed loudly, over the pounding of waves. He swung from his horse and hastened to the king's side. "If our man _is _in this lighthouse," Elrond said, forcing more calm into his voice, "I'm sure he saw us coming. He may be waiting just inside this door with an axe." Elrond gestured up at the unblinking beam shining from the lantern room far above their heads, vaulted against the low, knurling clouds. Gil-galad's eyes flashed at Elrond, though there was not a spark of light to catch from where he stood.

"This man," said Gil-galad, "may have a deeper shadow following him than can be found in a stale goblin tunnel, but he is not completely daft. No doubt he has seen our approach. He knows that you would cleave his skull if he were to attack me, and I do not believe it is his wish to die this night." Gil-galad turned and made as if to enter the door now, but Elrond clamped a hand over his shoulder.

"It seems to me, my lord," Elrond said through his teeth, "that we are dealing with a madman. I know you have your bouts of mild insanity but you cannot pretend to be able to guess, using logic, the motives of one such as he."

"For mercy's sake, Elrond, what would you have us do? _Knock?_"

"I would have us hope that you are right about him, but let me go in first."

"You have no blade."

"Give me your knife, then."

"No. Step aside," Gil-galad said, and tried to shoulder past Elrond. Elrond's nerves shuddered to disobey the orders of an incited king but his foresight shrieked its warning, and he shoved Gil-galad back and put his own hand on the door.

"Pardon me, my lord, but I'm having a moment. Give me your knife or I'm going in unarmed."

Gil-galad squinted wrathfully at his advisor, but he had been the benefactor of Elrond's foresight many times before, and could not ignore the hint. To Elrond's surprise he drew his own sword and handed the hilt to Elrond, leaving himself armed only with the knife. Elrond, hefting the heavy blade, did not question but turned and pushed finally though the door. It was very dark, and he paused at the threshold, listening.

"Oi," Gil-galad called, and Elrond flinched. "Come out. We know you want to be found, you scum-bucket. No more games, you'll only make it worse for yourself."

They were answered by the creaking boards over a blown-out window, straining from wind pressure. Gil-galad huffed and lunged past Elrond into the gloom.

"_Gil-galad!_" Elrond hissed again.

"He's up in the lantern room. We're wasting time, come on."

"Please remember," sighed Elrond, and tried to keep abreast of Gil-galad as they headed towards the stairs, "it will be upon _my_ head in court if I allow you to get killed by a madman."

"I am not about to be killed," retorted Gil-galad, and his voice was further away than Elrond had thought he'd be. "The stairs are over here. Don't you remember from last time?"

"Last time? Before the breaking of Beleriand?" Elrond asked, and followed Gil-galad's voice. What little light shone from the obscured night sky outside was hardly reaching into this murk. "There is a fair bit to remember about the War of Wrath and I'm afraid the location of this particular staircase did not make it as a permanent fixture of my memory…"

They fell into a tense silence as they took the tight coil of steps straight up. The walls pressed in around them as they gained height and Elrond would have had the distinct impression that they were far underground, winding through the passageways of an evil labyrinth instead of ascending a tower, were it not for the periodic window – small round things with crumbling sides, several of which had collapsed and left only pinpricks for air to pass through, or whistle through, as was the case this night.

The coils became even closer; they were only a few turns away from reaching the watchroom, which Elrond knew was just below the lantern room. Gil-galad's pace only quickened the closer they drew to the platform; if the arsonist was indeed in the lighthouse, surely he would have heard their approach, even over the chorus of the wind. Elrond was just about to remark of the absurdity of his being behind Gil-galad yet carrying the king's own sword when a series of thumps sounded above them, from the watchroom. Less than one round of stairs away from reaching the platform, Elrond heard a peculiar and unnerving liquid sound, and in front of him Gil-galad suddenly paused, looked up, and shielded his eyes.

Water fell from the cracks in the ceiling. Elrond hadn't even heard it start to rain but the floor above them was already leaking. The king hardly gave the detail a thought, and made to take the last half-round of steps at a leap, but Elrond's eyes swept across a half-collapsed window and saw east up the firth of Lhûn, clear through to the fire-lit windows of the House of Gil-galad, to the very room he had been settled in not long before.

"It's not raining," he said tersely.

Gil-galad swiped his hand across his head, were his hair had become wet, and rubbed his fingers together.

"It's oil, isn't it?" said Elrond.

Gil-galad's heavy silence was response enough. It was indeed oil. It seeped from the ceiling and through the cracks and fell to slicken the stone steps. Gil-galad had been standing under a particularly wide crack, and now backed down two steps to stand next to Elrond.

"I told you to let me go first," Elrond said. "Now that you have been effectively marinated, I trust you will let me go ahead, as our arsonist likely has a torch."

Gil-galad's face caught the thin light coming in from the Havens and he looked rather crazed with imperial wrath, so Elrond turned quickly and, gripping tight to the long blade, came up the last few steps and entered the watchroom.

The watchroom was really more of a watch_porch_, as there were no real walls here. It was a round platform wrapped in a low railing, and from its center rose the most tightly wound staircase Elrond had ever seen, and it led a short distance up into the lantern room itself. There was enough of a glow from the flame in the lantern room and from the reflection of the city against the belly of the clouds to show them what was before them, and there was probably even enough light for the thing that was before them to see them as well.

The man crouching at the base of the lantern room stairs was slight, smaller than Elrond had been expecting, but he was wearing a robe and hood that obscured his face, and Elrond found this extremely unsettling. What was more off-putting was the fact that the man held a flint in one hand, a steel in the other, and all about them lay empty oil jugs, tipped on their sides, strewn across the now-shining floor.

"I thought you said he wouldn't kill us," muttered Elrond over his shoulder to Gil-galad.

"If you lay a spark with that," Gil-galad called to the figure, stepping up next to Elrond, "you will burn with us."

The figure merely huffed a quiet laugh.

"Did you beckon us all the way up here to have a face-off?" the king demanded. "What is it you want, wretch? I am eager to see you before the Court of Lindon; speak!"

Elrond eyed the slackness in the man's posture, the lazy hang of his hands. The wind coming through the watchroom ruffled the man's robes and for a moment Elrond wondered if he'd died, if perhaps he'd quaffed one of the jugs of lantern oil, but that wouldn't have caused death, and Elrond saw no motive. Then again, he had not yet seen the motive behind _any_ of the arsonist's actions.

"Oh for mercy's sake – " Gil-galad started, and suddenly lunged forward, knife at the ready, towards the figure.

The man's hands snapped up and poised themselves to strike a spark. Gil-galad froze but could not stifle an exasperated sigh.

"Maybe he doesn't speak Westron," Elrond said.

"Of course he speaks Westron, everybody speaks Westron. He's just being difficult, the damned scum. Look, you, the outlook is already bleak, don't make it worse for yourself. And take that bloody hood off and face us like a man."

The figure huffed again, then tossed his head back to flip off the hood without taking away the threat of creating a spark with his two hands, and Elrond's mind flip-flopped. He did his best to keep the surprise out of his glare, but by the mirth in the woman's eyes he could see that he'd failed.

"Perhaps I should not have called you a wretch," Gil-galad said then, seeing the face of their arsonist. "Perhaps _wench_ would have been more fitting."

"Wench," the woman repeated wistfully, and her voice betrayed her age. Her face was eerily smooth for her years. "damned scum. Wretch. Scum-bucket. Such words from a High King, I venture, but I'll take them all, and more."

"Aye," said Gil-galad through his teeth, "and you'll hear worse once we bring you in."

"Ha! And you're going to simply _snatch_ me away, aren't you, Ereinion Gil-galad? And young Elrond Peredhil, I presume. I suppose you thought that I led you here because I _wanted_ to be caught."

Gil-galad did not respond, and Elrond's heart did a two-step. If this woman was indeed the criminal they had spent so much time worrying over, then her past and present actions pointed to the suggestion that she'd gone mad, or perhaps had never been sane. To die on an ancient lighthouse pyre, aflame alongside the High King himself, would seem a fitting end to one who had achieved such infamy.

"I see that," she said, and Elrond brought himself back. "I see you thinking there, Elrond Peredhil. You're wondering if I mean to strike a spark."

"We and the floor are covered in oil and you hold a flint and steel. An astute observation you make."

"Such lip is unbecoming in a prisoner. My intent is to go with you without struggle… but not just yet. First you must hear me out. And know that I have little hesitation ending it all right here in flame."

"Do continue," sighed Gil-galad, and Elrond had to admire the king for his forced patience. The woman merely smiled at that, and fixed them both with sunken, red eyes. Her long stare was a pleased, feline contempt, ruthless and unblinking. Focused as she was on boring into her captives, Elrond did not believe she was any match for a staring contest with Gil-galad, and was not surprised when she finally shot to her feet and looked away.

"Oh, I'm so happy I could just _burst_!" she exclaimed, and Elrond's heart sunk a bit to realize she hadn't, after all, gotten up to escape the harsh gaze of the king. "Finally, _finally_! I have the _High King himself_ squirming under my thumb! I'll be a mollusk if I ever thought this day would come. I just...I _just _wanted people to listen, and I couldn't ask for a better audience. I really couldn't," she said, shaking her head and smiling with a surprisingly convincing shadow of sincerity. "Thank you," she added, looking from one to the other. "Thank you for coming."

Elrond shoved savagely against the urge to allow his eyebrows to crawl up his forehead. It wouldn't do to react.

"After you put me away for arson and murder and everything," she said, and began to pace, "you'll remember me as the only woman who ever really had you squirming. And your people, yes! My name will be almost as popular as yours, Ereinion! I will be known as the woman who thwarted the High King!"

"Yes, and you've been very elusive. Why stop now?" asked Elrond. "Why turn yourself in?"

"I can hardly spend _all _my time plotting. Finding materials. Smuggling the right tools. Stalking around the wharves and markets to find the weak spots. Do you know how delicate these things are? The timing must be _perfect_. I could not afford any slipshod jobs, you see, not when my reputation was at stake. Exhausting, completely exhausting. I think I'm ready to retire, now, put my feet up behind the bars and listen to the people as they walk past outside my cell. They'll whisper my name. Everyone will know the power of one rampant individual. They'll say my name – I can hear it now! – they'll say my name to the children before tucking them in. Good night, little ones! Now you be good, or _she'll_ get you!"

"Excepting, of course," growled Gil-galad, "those parents who have lost their children to your fires. Do you think often of _them_?"

"I think _especially_ of them." With that statement, the muscles in Elrond's forearm twitched and the sword in his hand was as a war horse, pawing to lunge forward. Black rage threatened to cloud his judgment, but then he heard Gil-galad's voice.

"Elrond, remember your promise to me. I know it's difficult." Elrond closed his eyes and forced his arm to relax. He wished to retort that he'd only promised not to let Gil-galad kill the criminal, not that he would hold back from killing them himself.

"What promise?" she asked. "What are you talking about?"

"I made him promise to keep me from killing you," Gil-galad said flatly. She narrowed her eyes, but Gil-galad continued before she could say anything. "My advisor keeps his promises. You should be very grateful."

"I have no reason to be grateful. Life has given me _nothing._ What you don't realize about – "

"_Life _does not _give _anybody anything!" Gil-galad shouted, and the woman betrayed a slight flinch, which morphed quickly into a smirk. "Do not regale me with your story. _Nobody_ has any sympathy for a madwoman, a murderer! Once you are locked away, that will be the end of it. Your name will die with your body."

"How can you be so sure?"

"I'm getting a few ideas," Gil-galad growled.

"People gossip, my dear king, it is in their nature. Even _elves _gossip."

Elrond spared a glance towards Gil-galad, trying to read his stormy face. Speaking to a king as this woman was now speaking was reason enough for immediate execution, though he'd known that she was doomed for execution without that additional charge. The only reason Gil-galad was letting her believe that she'd end up behind bars in the morning and not in the Halls of Mandos was to keep her from lighting them all on fire. He wished to ask Gil-galad why he was so insistent that she be brought before court to be sentenced when the charge would certainly be execution, but now was hardly the time.

"How long must we tarry here?" Gil-galad snarled, clearly at the end of his rope. "Surely you are eager to have your name written into the city's ledger list of dangerous villains."

"Yes, thrilling as that may be, I find this to be rather more so. Why, I haven't been this happy since… I suppose since my flaming armada earlier. I watched the last bits of it from up here, you know. It was beautiful."

"I dearly hope you have no family," Gil-galad sighed.

"I had one of those," the woman mused, and Elrond noted the past tense. "My first husband, Rogard, perished off the coast years ago, the lucky bastard. Rolled to sleep by the waves. But then there was Dryden, for a while… and Farley after _him._ And then Braxton. Ugh, he was _awful._"

"No surprise that they left you," Gil-galad muttered. The woman let out a shriek of mirth and clicked the flint and steel together as if clapping. Elrond's nerves twitched.

"_Left_ me? Surely you don't believe I would have let them just walk away intact!... Oh, I suppose you're right, they did _leave_. In a sense. Left me and all those maggots. Let's see… First there was Daisy. Rogard picked that name. Rather pathetic. Dryden gave me Devon and Linsey. Farley wasn't around to name the twins, and they were gone by the time I met Braxton…"

Elrond's heart felt as if it were being drained of life, suffocated. The madwoman's words were nauseating. Perhaps it was all a figment of her own imagination. Perhaps this past family of hers had never existed.

"… Braxton let me name the last three, so I picked Míriel, Fingolfin, and Lúthien, but I never told anybody. They took their names to the grave. I thought that was a nice gesture." Elrond shut out his rage with a long, hard blink. "Oh, pardon me," said the woman then. "You don't even know _my _name! After all our talk, how rude of me, how very rude. Sometimes I forget my manners. My name is – "

Elrond missed completely Gil-galad's sudden movement, but he easily caught the sharp sound of a flying blade and did not miss the sight of the woman's hand jerking back from the impact of Gil-galad's knife, did not miss the sound of the flint in her hand dropping into the oil on the boards below, did not miss the bloom of crimson, and did not miss Gil-galad's leap forward.

Elrond found himself springing into action before he knew what his own intentions were. The woman made a mad grab for the flint on the ground but slipped in the oil and could not catch her balance. Gil-galad was upon her in a heartbeat, wrenching his blade from her hand as Elrond reached his side and threw an arm across the king's chest.

"You said – "

Gil-galad shoved him away, and Elrond stumbled backwards with the savage force, barely keeping his own balance.

"I will not kill her," the king snarled, though Elrond could see no other possible future, from the wrath in Gil-galad's eyes. The woman had struggled to her knees in the oil and was lashing out with her bare hands but Gil-galad did not seem to notice; he pushed her back into the stairs and the wind danced wildly around them, spiraling up to the lantern room, throwing Elrond's hair in front of his eyes and muffling his ears, but he heard Gil-galad say something softly, to the woman, something completely devoid of the hatred that so occupied his gaze. Immediately following, Elrond heard a sickening _crack, crack, pop_, and a screech ripped the air, followed by breathless, animal wailing.

Elrond found his feet and lunged forward – to help the king or the woman, he knew not – but the woman had slipped out of the king's grasp, fumbling around the other side of the lighthouse stairs with twisted hands. Gil-galad caught her up easily again and they disappeared behind the coil of stairs with a flash of Gil-galad's knife, and then came the sound of a mouth forced open and the disarticulated longing of a wailing newborn, or the deranged, or the moribund. Elrond's strides would not carry him fast enough; she screamed, and then she gagged, and then she continued to scream, and when he'd come finally around the curve of the stairs a crimson sheet fell from the woman's mouth and her face was black with blood and shadow. Her severed tongue lay miserably in the oil and blood across the deck. She clawed around her mouth with her hands but her fingers were twisted and broken horribly.

Gil-galad sheathed his knife, exhaled, and backed away. The healer in Elrond was aching, but the advisor in him froze his body, and in looking upon his king his heart flinched in dread. It was fleeting but he'd now been witness to a side of Gil-galad he hadn't previously been able to believe existed. The king spoke then, and his voice was no longer angry, nor did it mock.

"It appears you have killed all who have known your name," he said, through the woman's moans, "and now you will never again make a coherent noise. I have ruined your hands; you will henceforth be able to put no quill to parchment. Your name has effectively died."

The woman finally silenced and stared wildly up at Gil-galad, comprehending what he had done. She breathed loudly, still gagging on blood.

"Yet you will live. You will see the word go on as if you had never existed, and they will never know your story. We will announce your capture to the masses, and you, the arsonist, will be a mystery eagerly forgotten. Your years will pass in observed anonymity."

The woman's eyes rolled in her head, the whites crescent moons set over a red land. She fell to her hands and knees and felt desperately through the pools with her warped fingers, crying out in her sudden misery and pain but persisting until finally she'd found the two dropped objects, her flint and steel. She managed to get her fingers around the chunk of flint but the crook of the steel was too much for the crooked bones and she could not strike it.

"You will never lay another spark," Gil-galad called to her, over the wind, and his voice was still clear of the contempt he'd previously shown.

The woman tried again, and kept trying for several chilling moments, trying to get a grip on the steel, trying to aim the strike correctly so as to scorch her new and only life out of existence, but she could not do it. The flint and the steel tumbled from her compromised grasp and she hung her head and wept, and could not cover her tears.

Elrond turned his eyes away from the sight and found himself staring at Gil-galad, as if for the first time. The king's face was not derisive, or pleased, or doubtful. There may have been a trace of sorrow, but mostly the expression was unfathomable, and Elrond did not want to stare. Instead he gave in and stepped to help the woman to her feet so they could begin the journey back to the Havens.

The woman, seeing his approach, struggled to her feet.

"Look, let me – " Elrond began to implore her, and then she took three jerky, rapid steps toward the eastern railing, and tipped herself neatly over the edge.

_Should have seen that coming,_ Elrond thought, and found himself diving over the edge after her.

Later he would wonder what undercurrent thoughts had gone to making that decision. He had known that the east foundation of the lighthouse was flush with the waves, and that there was little danger of being dashed against the rocks, but he hadn't _thought _it, not really. He would wonder if he'd jumped because he'd felt pity for the woman and had found it in himself to care, or if he'd jumped in order to keep her from escaping the harsh mercy of an anonymous life.

It was dark and he was falling fast and he couldn't see the waves very well but he could _hear _them crashing and frothing, and then the seas caught him. He surfaced and breathed against the shock of briny water and felt the reaching hands of underwater forces pulling him into a cleaving heave towards the lighthouse foundation, and he wondered if he would end up like Rogard, rolled to sleep by the sea. Something grabbed at his arm and he turned in time to see Gil-galad before being slammed up against the rough stone, and then dragged down with the rip current.

He tried to remember what he was doing down here. _The woman. Find the woman. _It was hard for him to remember why it was so important to find her when he couldn't put a name to the face.

"There," said Gil-galad, and out on the next wave Elrond could see a lump breaking the surface and thrashing weakly. After two more intimate encounters with foundation and stone, they drew up next to her and between them managed to drag her body out of the fray and up onto the time-smoothed rocks. She was conscious and breathing and seemed to have lost all conviction to live. Blood still poured freely from her mouth, and she waved her broken hands uselessly in front of her, trying to fend off Elrond as he crouched above her. He easily thwarted her attempts and, using pressure points, was able to put her into a temporarily lapsed mental state. The stump of her tongue would need to be cauterized, and she would have to be made dry and warm soon to ward off potentially fatal shock. He stood to tell this to Gil-galad but found he had no words upon facing the king. A stinging pain began to wrap around his left shin, and he glanced down to see torn skin and fabric.

"I dropped your blade in the water," Elrond said, finally. "My apologies."

"No matter. This is my chance to pick up the spear. I've never been fond of swords."

The boulders between where they stood and where the horses were waiting were slick and steep; together they hefted the woman halfway up the distance, but Elrond began to realize that his leg hadn't merely been grazed. Gil-galad took the woman over his shoulder and carried her the rest of the way, and Elrond grit his teeth and hauled himself over the last few boulders.

"She will have to be seen before she is brought before the court," Elrond said, and mounted painfully up onto his horse. Gil-galad hefted the woman up to Elrond and he held her limp form.

"She is no longer bound for the court," Gil-galad said, and swung up onto his own horse. They kicked forward and started their ride back up the heathered path towards the city. The wind made Elrond's damp skin crawl, and he shivered. "The judges will have to accept that we have taken care of everything. You will announce to the city that our arsonist has been tried and found guilty, and executed by the blade of the king."

"You would have me lie?"

"There is still the possibility of truth. Time will give her the opportunity to start anew."

_Time will give her the opportunity to abandon the last strings of sanity,_ Elrond thought, but did not say it. Gil-galad was right; they would know with time.

"If not to the judges, then, where is she bound?"

"To the merchant docks. To Círdan."

Elrond nodded, and the woman in front of him lolled to the side and coughed weekly. He steadied her against his chest and saw her in the sun on the wharves, staring silent from an alcove behind Círdan's current project, watching the ships come billowing in on the west wind, furling the sails for the newly-laid docks. The merchant families all debarking their flag-marked crafts and parading up in their exotic clothes that whipped in the breeze. The elders with their hewn canes and the young lads with energy strung up like a bow and the bare-foot children would pass the cripple in her alcove, and they would stare with their pity and luck and admiration and she would begin to see things.

"What did you tell her?" Elrond asked, as they skirted around the outbuildings of the city and took the less-trodden path along the quiet fish docks.

"When?"

"Before ruining her hands."

Gil-galad did not answer right away. They were approaching the back entrance of a medical bay, but the bay would most likely be full of burn victims. The smell of smoke hung heavy in the air here, and they rode by the door. Voices echoed from within the building, and nobody was out of doors to see them pass. Gil-galad was leading them directly to Círdan's home.

"That such physical pain must be the long prelude to her punishment… and her revival, with luck… is a vast misfortune. And for that I felt remorse."

Elrond agreed, and knew it would be a long time – perhaps years – before he would be able to completely fathom Gil-galad's thoughts and actions this night. In a way they were more puzzling than those of the woman herself. The wind had pushed the clouds inland and above them the dark skies were being relit with tiny lanterns, sharp in the pre-dawn hours, and Elrond was furtively grateful that he and Gil-galad hadn't committed justice under the watch of stars.

* * *

_**A/N: **__Would early Second-Age elven port cities have a judicial system for really awful villains? I think it's more likely that said villains would be killed on the spot, or at least on 'a' spot. Maybe this chapter was AU, but alignment with canon Legendarium was second priority. This story was firstly a (somewhat hypocritical) response to a recent and real-life tragedy. _


	9. Dog Friend

**9: Dog Friend**

_Once upon a time, Elrond didn't know the first thing about the healing arts. (Le gasp!) Compassion and blissful ignorance go a long way towards a sudden education. _

_**A/N: **__I have a shaky (at best) understanding of how elves age in mind and body, and an even shakier grasp of exactly when the Mouths of Sirion were destroyed, and how old Elrond supposedly was at that point, so I apologize for any and all mistakes, as I'm sure they are present… If you have any timeline/child-Elrond insights, I hope you share them with me. _

* * *

_First Age 535_

_Mouths of Sirion_

By the time the winds had died down enough for Nana to let him out of their home, all the excitement was nearly past. With her grudging permission Elrond had catapulted from the stoop and plunged into the waning drizzle, sinking ankle-deep in water, puddles of what the elders had told him were the tears of the clouds. He didn't mind getting muddy – in fact he rather loved the mud – but what he _really _wanted to feel was the wind.

"Don't go down to the docks, Elrond," Nana called after him. "There might be a riptide. Do you hear me?"

"Yes, Nana," he shouted, and turned south, away from the path that would have led him to the beach.

Early in the morning it had come ripping down from the western sky, pushing a great heaving wave of bracken towards shore. Some of the merchants had already taken off into the swash, and they'd sure had to sail back quick – which hadn't been hard, given the powerful winds. Everyone had tied their boats up tight and fled from the docks and Nana hadn't even let Elrond run down to the wharf to see the incoming burls of clouds, she'd just stowed him down in the cellar like the sailors stowed sacks of flour belowdecks when it rained.

She came down too, herding Elros in front, and so did all the members of the House of Eärendil. Círdan came down a while later, when it was _really _blowing hard, and spent a few moments assuring Nana that Ada was going to be all right in his big ship, and that Ada was the greatest mariner of all time. After that they were all silent for a few moments and Elrond could hear the foundation creaking above their heads.

"Círdan, is this a gale?" Elrond had asked.

"Sure as that's gale-force wind-speed, my lad, but properly it's a squall."

"Squall?"

"Squall. I see that look in your eyes, little lad. I know you like the weather but squalls are mighty fierce to behold. Best stay stashed down here until the worst is over, savvy?"

"Savvy," Elrond had replied, glum. He was no shipwright but he could not imagine how the wind could possibly be harmful. What was there for it to knock over, besides buildings? This far out on the delta there were few dangers. The rushes and reeds, though tall as trees, were far more flexible. They bent in the wind.

Now he sped full-tilt through the forest of reeds, down the boardwalks that spanned the soggier areas, across the little field of dunes which had shifted drastically since he'd seen them yesterday. He'd had to take an altered route to the beach so Nana wouldn't suspect where he'd gone. All the while his eyes were locked on the sky, searching for the low, roiling clouds, the ones that really got going fast. He only tripped once, on a chunk of warped driftwood reaching out of the sand, before finally coming into sight of the south wharf. None of the big boats could fit up the channel here, and they would all dock at the northern landing. This one was Elrond's favorite wharf, though, despite that it was less used.

He stopped on top of the last dune to breathe, and to brush the sand out of his hair and off the side of his face that he'd landed on. The clouds had passed. He could see their wispy tails disappearing over the canopy of vegetation to the east, far past his house. In their wake they drew those low clouds, the boring ones that only ever seemed to bring slate-straight rain. With them went the winds; the air had slowed, and the little poplars, those silly trees that always seemed to think that the Mouths of Sirion was a swell place to grow, and that always ended up getting buried by the shifting sands, were no longer dancing. There were few sounds that delighted Elrond as much as the sound of dancing poplar leaves.

Another sound, altogether unexpected, came to his ears instead. It had been quiet, and he wasn't entirely sure he'd even heard it, and he sort of hoped that he hadn't, because it wasn't a good sound. He narrowed his eyes and gazed down at the wharf and docks. The boats were all still there, far as he could tell, though Trego's little dinghy had taken on a fair amount of water. Several of them looked disheveled, like when Elrond and Elros tussled and their hair got all messed up. Some of the rigging had gotten tangled and a few sails were holding on by a few less hitches.

There, that sound again! Elrond's heart at once leapt and sunk. A miserable sound, a sort of keening yip, had come from the wharves. It was the sound of something, or someone, that needed help. He glanced around to see that nobody had yet ventured back to the docks, and then, seeing as though the responsibility of helping whatever needed help had fallen squarely upon his young shoulders, he started down the dune at a cautious gallop.

At first he searched quietly, walking on the balls of his feet, avoiding the dock beams that he knew were especially creaky. He would not have admitted it to Círdan but he had heard many stories of the things that dwelled in the deep of the ocean and now he was a little frightened; what if one of them had been thrown into the shallows in the squall? What if one of them had landed on the decks of one of these boats? But the rain soon ceased, the sky started to brighten, the waves calmed, and the wharf became an altogether more welcoming place, the place Elrond had grown to love, and his spirit became more confident.

"Hello?" he called. "Is somebody here? Do you need help?"

He glanced suddenly back to the reedline, hoping nobody was coming. He must look a right fool, calling out like this to some unseen entity. He made his way past Círdan's latest vessel, half-finished and tied tight, and didn't bother to jump over the local creaky boards. They shrieked, and he wondered if the noises he'd heard had simply been the groaning of twisting wood.

He heard it again, then, and the sound made him jump. It had come from the old fish house in the middle of the wharf, and it had _definitely_ not been a creaking board. He hesitated for a moment before clenching his jaw and stepping towards the fish house, once again on the balls of his feet. He didn't have a knife with him right now, and he was alone. Maybe he should wait for an older person to come, just in case. Nana wouldn't approve… though her lack of approval hadn't stopped him from doing a number of stupid things so far in his short life. Anyways, whatever was making the noise couldn't want to eat him. If it wanted to eat him it would have snuck up behind him quiet-like, right?

The last thought that passed through his head before he reached the door was that sometimes the fishermen brought in strange creatures that had gotten tangled in the nets, weird things from the depths of the sea that made weird noises and sometimes the adults wouldn't let Elrond near because the thing would be poisonous or would have teeth or ghastly appendages and they wouldn't really know what to do with it. But he reminded himself that this was the _old_ fish house. The fishermen probably hadn't opened the doors in the last three years. It was strange that they hadn't taken down its rotten boards yet.

Elrond held out his hand, willing it not to tremble, set the pads of his fingers carefully upon the knotted, waterlogged wood of the door, and pushed.

The door swung in a few inches and then swung back in his face and he reached to give it a proper shove when another sound came to him.

_ Thump thump thump thump thump…_

Right inside the fish house, something had started to thump when he'd pushed the door. Elrond swallowed. Really, perhaps this wasn't the best idea.

_Thump thump thump thump thump…_

Whatever was making those pitiful noises and thumping like that had to be some sort of horror from the deep with an unnatural number of legs and probably huge pinchers the size of his leg and no way was he going to go in there. No way.

_Thump thump… thump._

The thumping stopped. Elrond held his breath and listened to silence. The sky seemed to be really clearing now and there might have even been some weak sunlight coming down on him but he wasn't going to tear his eyes off the door to actually look at the sky. He contemplated making a break for it, sprinting off the docks and over the dunes and through the reeds and mud and all the way back to Nana and Círdan and Elros, who was probably playing with the other children somewhere safe and he'd never believe Elrond when he told him what he'd heard.

With that thought, Elrond's hand acted of its own accord. It reached out and shoved the door in with such force that it dragged the rest of his body forward and then he was standing square in the doorway and his eyes went everywhere at once, into every empty corner, across every gap in the boards, over all the old buoys and rotten lines and sails and his heart was pounding so hard that it took him a second to realize the thumping had started up again and by that time surely it was too late for him, he'd be eaten and his bones would be found years later etched with tiny teeth-marks where the ship rats had gnawed them down –

Movement caught his eye. A tail was wagging, and it wagged with such force that it was hitting the side of the fish house and creating a very powerful thumping noise. It appeared to be attached to a pile of rotted net lines, and on the other side of the pile, a furry face was staring at him.

"Ai," Elrond hissed, "dog, I thought you were a monster!" He doubled over his knees for a second to breathe out his fright and get a handle on his nerves before looking back up to the dog. "You had me frightened! Don't tell Elros, I'd never hear the end of it!"

The dog's tail continued to thump against the wall, and he stared at Elrond earnestly, as if to say, _of course I won't tell Elros. I would never do that._

"Was it you that was making those awful noises, then?" Elrond asked, and fell into a crouch to regard the dog. The dog merely stared at him, and tilted his furry head. His tail wagged with even more exuberance. "Did you stay here through the squall?" Elrond asked, suddenly impressed. "My Nana made me hide in the basement! I bet you saw everything!"

The dog, his eyes never leaving Elrond's, shifted suddenly as if to get up. He let out a sudden yip and blinked in surprise for just a moment before settling back into his wagging and staring.

"You're stuck, aren't you?" Elrond asked. The anchor must have fallen on the dog during the squall, with all the wind. It was a very drafty structure. "You were calling for help because you're stuck. Lucky I'm around," Elrond said, coming forward and reaching for the pile of netting. "Everyone else was too afraid to come down here, they thought there'd be a riptide. I'm not afraid of riptides," he told the dog, and pulled at the netting. It was stuck around the tines of a rusty little anchor. The anchor was heavy and he tried to shift it but this made the dog yip again. Elrond stopped. If the anchor was heavy enough for him to have trouble shifting it, it must be quite heavy indeed, and it looked like it was keeping the dog from getting up.

"The anchor has to move, dog," he said, to explain what he was about to do. He wrapped his hands around the two arms of the anchor and leaned back, levering himself as much as he could, and it tipped backwards, nearly catching his foot but instead hitting the ground with a hollow _clunk_. The dog, freed from the weight of the anchor, attempted to get up again. His tail wound in a wide circle to keep his balance and the rest of the netting sloughed off but the dog yipped again and did not stand square on his four legs.

"Is your paw hurt?" Elrond asked the dog. "Bruised? I've had bruises before." The dog would not put weight on his left front paw, and opted to sit on his haunches, the better to stare up into Elrond's face and wag his tail without losing his balance. He was really a rather pathetic creature. His fur was sodden and tufty, and one ear flopped a bit to the side. Like all wharf dogs, he was well-fed and did not look hungry but still there was a sort of desperate glint in his marble eyes. Elrond scooted up to sit in front of the dog. He let the dog sniff his hand and then he gave him a scratch behind the ear. The dog didn't seem to care either way. He wagged his tail and stared deeply and his dangling paw trembled a little.

"Ouch," Elrond murmured in sympathy. The leg above the dog's wrist seemed a bit crooked to him, like a snapped branch. He wasn't entirely sure what that meant. When branches snapped, that was that and the tree would grow a new one. Of course bones didn't snap because that would mean that a body would have to grow a new bone and that seemed a bit silly to him. Still, it seemed like it was very painful.

"All right, dog," he said, and stood. "You wait right there. I'm going to go get Healer Niervän. He'll know what to do, he always does. He's very smart and very old. Wait here, all right?"

The dog's eyes told Elrond that he wouldn't even think of moving.

"I'm going to run then," Elrond said. "I'll be back soon!"

He erupted from the fish house, out into the comparatively-bright late-morning light. His feet slapping against the wharf shattered the tranquil chatter of waves against the pilings. He headed straight inland this time. He hadn't told the dog but it was a decent run all the way to Niervän's ward. He wasn't sure he would be able to run the whole way, but he was going to try. The dunes were the hardest to run across and he thought maybe he should have taken the road, but it was so curvy. Then through the groves and the shallows beneath the reeds, where his wild running splashed him from head to toe with water and sand and mud and secretly this delighted him but only a little because he was on a serious mission. He skirted past his house because he knew Nana would stop him if she saw him in such a state, and then he'd hit the edge of the little city and was running down the walks and cobbles that glistened wet like the backs of thousands of turtles. A few people were out, straightening the sign posts and righting a few carts and some of them lifted their gazes as he shot past but either he was too fast for them to recognize him or he was too dirty because nobody called out.

He had to stop running when he'd crossed the last bridge over the main delta branch, the one that separated the barracks from the healing ward. His lungs were burning and the back of his throat tasted funny and his feet hurt from hitting the cobbles so hard but still he kept up a quick walk all the way to the steps of Niervän's. Up and through the door, past the ivy pillars and the little waterfall.

An elleth with the white sash of the healers came out from a room ahead of Elrond. Elrond didn't recognize her but this was a bit of an emergency so he called out to her anyways.

"Excuse me," he cried, breathless, and hurried towards her. She looked down and her eyes widened immediately.

"Young lord, what has happened?" she asked. A lot of people that he didn't recognize knew that he was a young lord, and he never questioned this. "Are you hurt? Were you out in the tempest?" she asked, kneeling down to his level.

"Actually it was a squall," he gasped, still trying to gain his breath. "Nana made me stay in the basement so I didn't get to see it but do you know where Healer Niervän is?"

"Yes, he is in his quarters, preparing. Are you hurt, Lord Elrond?"

"I am fine, thank you. Can I speak with Healer Niervän?"

The elleth's eyes shut a little as she smiled. "We can try. Come," she said, and led him down the way towards where Elrond knew his quarters were. Her pace was slower, which let him catch his breath some, but he couldn't get the image of the dog's desperate eyes out of his mind. He hoped Niervän liked to run. With luck, Niervän wouldn't mind carrying Elrond on his shoulders on the way to the wharf.

The master-healer's door was wide open, and there were a few sodden people standing just outside the door, peeking in. Most of them were sailor men and Elrond could see between their forest of legs because they were wearing pants and boots instead of robes, and through all that he could see a big, billowy white robe that had to be Niervän.

"There is a line, Lord Elrond," said the elleth. "Can you be good and wait in line for your turn to speak to Niervän?"

"Yes," he said, nodding, and took his place behind the last of the men. The elleth turned away and disappeared through another hallway. Elrond then turned to start pushing his way through the forest of muddied legs. In his most recent lessons he'd learned that 'can you' and 'would you' had slightly different meanings, but the difference was pretty big in this case. The elleth probably hadn't said what she'd meant to say but that wasn't his problem. Maybe she needed to review her language lessons.

Sometimes Elrond couldn't wait to grow up and be tall but now was not one of those times. He was through the legs before anybody got the chance to look down and see what the commotion was. Stepping into the room, he saw that the white robes were indeed Niervän's, and the healer was talking with two others that wore the white sash, as well as a scruffy-looking captain that Elrond recognized to be one of the merchant men. He looked over and down at Elrond and his eyes widened in surprise. Niervän's eyes followed, and the poor old healer looked so shocked for a moment that Elrond feared his face would get stuck in that position.

"What happened?" asked the healer, kneeling and beckoning Elrond forward. "Were you caught in the torrent?"

"Actually it was a squall," Elrond began.

"The little lad's righ'," grunted the merchant captain, with a smile.

"Are you injured?" Niervän asked, wiping the mud from Elrond's face and arms.

"No, Healer Niervän, but I found someone who needs help down at the wharf. Please come!"

"Who?" Niervän asked, looking suddenly quite torn. "How badly?"

"One of the wharf dogs. He was trapped under an anchor. I think he hurt his leg."

"Oh, Elrond," Niervän sighed, as if from both relief and sadness. "My small friend, the wharf dogs are tougher than kelp stems. You would be surprised at what they can handle. The captain here had his ship dashed against the shoals in the riptide and some of his crew was injured. I need to see to them. Do you understand?"

"Yes, Healer Niervän. Can you tell me what to do to help the dog?"

"You have such compassion, little Elrond! But I think it would be best for us to leave the dog alone. I would bet that the dog will be up and good as new tomorrow morning. Wait and see. Dogs are quite resilient. Now, I need to look to the health of my fellow elves and men before I can look to the health of beasts. Go get cleaned up now, and be careful out there."

**-)O(-**

Since Niervän had called off the emergency, Elrond felt no need to run back to the fish house. He took his time and skirted around the edge of the old parts of the city, where the sailors liked to tell stories and take long droughts from wineskins. He heard one of them say that the seas were confused and that it was best not to venture out today. Elrond was not so surprised, then, to see that the south wharf was still abandoned when he finally returned.

"Hello," Elrond said as he pushed once again into the fish house. The dog had moved a few feet off to the side, and now his tail thumped against a different wall upon seeing Elrond. "Good news. Niervän says dogs are resilient. I think that means that you're as tough as a kelp stem and that's pretty tough. He says you'll be better in the morning."

Something was different about the dog. He wasn't looking so bug-eyed at Elrond and he no longer seemed so eager to come to his feet. He lay on his belly and stared glassily up at Elrond.

"You look under-the-weather," Elrond said, which was something he'd heard Nana say before. "_Are _you going to be better in the morning?"

The dog merely blinked.

Elrond peered closer at the dog's paw and saw that the part that was crooked was now surrounded by a lot more leg than last he'd seen, as if a large bubble was growing around the injury. Last year Elros had jammed his toe on a boulder and the same thing had happened.

"Ew," Elrond observed. "That must hurt."

_Thump,_ said the dog's tail. Elrond reached over and scratched the dog's ear again, pondering. Clearly, this dog was not of the belief that the morning would bring any relief. Niervän was too busy with helping men and elves to bother with a beast, and the healer hadn't told Elrond how to help the dog. Perhaps Niervän would finish with what he was doing fast so that he could help the dog sooner but Elrond had seen how much care the healer took over his patients. It would be a while.

"I know I could help you," Elrond assured the dog, "if I just knew how. Nana says I'm smart but I haven't learned about dog paws yet."

"Who are you talking to?" asked a voice, and Elrond nearly jumped out of his skin. He whirled around, even though he'd known immediately who it was.

"Elros! I didn't hear you come!"

"That's because I was walking like a fox. Chera taught me how," Elros said, gesturing over his shoulder where the elleth Chera stood. "I knew I'd find you here. Who are you talking to?" Elros asked, coming into the fish house.

"This dog," Elrond said. "He's hurt."

"What makes you think it's a he?"

"What makes you think he's _not _a he?"

"There's no way to tell. You're just making things up."

"He's a he," said Chera calmly, from behind. The twins turned to her.

"Now you're taking sides?" asked Elros. "I thought you were _my _friend!"

"But I _know_ he's a he!" said Chera, indignant.

"Yeah? How?"

"Ellyth know these things," she said, crossing her arms and turning up her nose. "You shouldn't be sitting in this old fish house, Elrond, it's unsafe. The legs are rotting. What if the squall this morning weakened it?"

"It's still strong," said Elrond, and wondered if she knew what a squall was because she was an elleth and ellyth knew things. "Anyways, the dog is hurt. Healer Niervän is too busy to come help. He said that dogs are resilient and that the wound would be gone in the morning."

"Good," said Elros. "That does look painful."

"I don't know if he'll be better in the morning," said Elrond, pushing away the sudden jealousy that Elros knew what 'resilient' meant and he himself hadn't.

"Brother, must you doubt so much? The dog isn't crying out, is he? Come on, let's go, we can check on the dog tomorrow and if he's not better we'll carry him up to Niervän ourselves! Chera and I are going to find crayfish in the shallows."

"I want to stay with the dog."

"You'll waste the day!"

"But the dog will be lonely while he heals! If he heals," Elrond added sourly.

"Fine, brother, spend your time. We'll be up the way."

Chera and Elros disappeared again, and they must have been walking like foxes because Elrond barely heard their retreat. He turned to the dog and brushed his fur again. This time his tail flopped weakly. It was quite a sad sight. If only Niervän had had the time to tell Elrond what to do. He didn't dare try to help the dog himself. What if the paw fell off? Elros was right; the dog wasn't crying or anything, but the dog did not look anywhere near being happy. It was strange to see an unhappy wharf dog.

"I wonder how old you are," Elrond murmured. Had the dog been in other squalls before? Had he ever hurt his paw? Perhaps he had been here before the wharf had been built, which was long ago indeed. Elrond didn't know much about dogs, except that they liked fish heads and they were generally considered bad luck aboard a ship.

"Perhaps you are not so different than elves," he said. "You're all furry and you've got a tail, but…" Elrond's words petered out and he fell silent. The dog was really staring at him now. Nobody had ever looked at Elrond like that before, as if his own words were the most important thing in the world. Only a true friend would look so interested without interrupting him or telling him what to do.

An idea sprang into Elrond's mind, and he immediately wanted to dismiss it because it seemed like something Elros would do, and most of Elros's ideas bordered on what Ada would call 'insanity'. He held up his hand and wiggled his fingers, observing their joints, and then looked down at the dog's paw. The dog had fingers too, they were just shorter. The dog had a wrist, just like Elrond, and even had a thumb. There was the dog elbow, and maybe a dog shoulder, though it looked different than an elf's shoulder.

"Dog, Niervän said he wouldn't treat beasts when there were people to look after, and he wouldn't tell me how to fix you, but…" Yes, maybe this wasn't so insane. It made sense. If he could just make his arm look something like the dog's arm, and go to Niervän, the healer would _have _to fix Elrond. Then Elrond would know how to fix the dog. He was sure that it would hurt, because the dog certainly did not look happy about it, but Elrond knew what it meant to be a good friend. And he wouldn't have to _really _bend his arm that much; just a little, to get an idea of what to do to fix it. Anything more and Nana would probably get wind of what he'd done, and Elrond didn't think Nana would approve of this.

"I have a plan, dog," he said, and stood. The dog watched him closely. "How did you make your limb do that?" Elrond asked, though he knew the dog wouldn't answer. Elrond grit his teeth and took his right arm in his left and gave it a savage wrench, but nothing happened. His arm wasn't even a little crooked. He braced his thumb against his left wrist, as if he were about to snap a dead sapling, but again nothing happened. His brow furrowed and he considered the problem.

He tried standing on his wrist and straightening up but the angle was awkward and it made his shoulder feel strange. He tried bracing his hand against the wall and leaning into it but that did absolutely nothing. He even tried smacking his forearm against the corner of the fish house but that kind of hurt, and besides, he wasn't looking for a bruise; he just wanted his arm to bend a little.

The dog was raising his eyebrows at Elrond.

"Maybe we _are_ more different than that," he finally said. "Nevermind. I guess elves can't do that with their arms." Glum, he considered his options. If Niervän wouldn't see the dog, then the next best person was, of course, Nana. She could at least make the dog comfortable until he was better; of this Elrond was certain.

"I'll take you home with me then," Elrond stated. "I guess I'll carry you." He reached down to gently scoop up the dog and the dog's face became decidedly more worried than it had been, but still he didn't struggle much when Elrond hefted him up into his arms. The dog was heavier than Elrond had been expecting and he stumbled a bit to the left, and then the right, before he got his feet squarely under him. The dog let out a short whine and his eyes rolled back a little as he stared longingly back to the ground.

"It's a long walk, dog. I really think I should carry you," Elrond panted, and turned for the door of the fish house. This might be hard but he would take it slow. Círdan was always telling people to take things slowly; now was probably one of those times.

"You smell like fish heads," he said to the dog, in an effort to put him more at ease with being picked up and carried around. Abruptly the air was filled with a horrible shrieking noise and the dog was struggling and for a moment Elrond feared that he'd offended the dog and now the dog was yelling at him and wanting to get down but then the floor of the fish house jerked to the side and Elrond understood that Chera had been right after all, the beams hadn't been so sound. The dog was panicking and flailing and Elrond bent to put him down before either of them got hurt more but the deck of the wharf had suddenly risen so really all Elrond had to do was hold the dog out and let go.

Then the dog was barking and staring down at him from the wharf dock and the wind was rushing up, as was his stomach. He grabbed wildly first for the edge of the wharf, then for the rails of the pilings, and then for the fish house walls themselves, but the walls were falling right along with him, so it didn't really do any good, and anyways it didn't much matter because there wasn't _that _far to fall before the huge stumps of old pilings would catch the defeated fish house, before it hit the water, and he himself would just –

**-)O(-**

"I told him so. I did."

"Chera, stop it," said Elros. "You're being mean."

"But I _did_, I said it was a bad idea! If he had _listened,_ he wouldn't have broken his – "

"What are you doing _now?_" Elrond wailed, causing Healer Niervän to pause and look up from his work.

"I am making sure that I have reduced the bones properly."

"How can you tell if you've reduced them properly?" Elrond asked, willing his eyeballs to swallow back the tears that were threatening. He did not want to cry in front of the healer. Niervän had been so nice so far. Elrond had been worried that Niervän would have been angry to see him again today but instead the healer had been very warm, and had had him change into soft, dry clothing right away.

"One first must know," Niervän said, as he nudged his fingers up Elrond's forearm, "what the bones here look like without all this skin and muscle on them, and one must also know what the relationship between each bone involved is."

"What do you mean, relationship?" Elrond asked, blinking, and some tears fell anyways.

"I mean the way they connect. For instance, our special relationship is that we're both sitting across from one another, and we are connected by your forearm and my fingers. At least – … I say, Elrond, you made it through all the messy business of resetting this without too much fuss, why do tears fall _now? _You are doing fine. This is very brave."

Elrond sniffed and stared resolutely at what Niervän was doing, and repeated the steps so far in his head. _Ice. Salve. Setting… or was it reducing?... the bones. _Next came checking for proper reduction but Elrond couldn't remember which way Niervän had said to tug the bones back into place, and the Healer had told Elrond that the way bones were reduced depended completely on the type of _break _that had taken place.

Elrond had not liked learning that bones did not bend like the sapling trees or like tall reeds in a squall. Apparently they _broke_, just like an old tree's branch, except bones didn't grow back. Elrond thought that was a strange way to put a person together, and he was very rapidly losing confidence in his ability to fix the dog's broken leg. This was complicated. Niervän was now approaching him with a length of cloth and a set of slightly-twisted rods and Elrond bit his tongue to keep from sobbing for a moment before opening his mouth.

"What's that stuff?"

"A splint and a sling."

"What's a splint and a sling?" Elrond asked, on the verge of despair. He most definitely did not have a splint and a sling to lend to the dog. Niervän, who had sat opposite of him again and had been reaching for Elrond's arm, paused.

"A splint will keep your bones in place while they knit back together. A sling will keep your whole arm from moving about. My, but you're curious."

"Bones don't _knit_!" Elrond insisted. The prospect of an arm bone knitting a shawl was just silly. Was Niervän making fun of him now?

"_Knit_ means more than just crafting. _Knit _also means _mend._"

"Don't worry, Healer Niervän," said Elros from the side, rolling his eyes. "Elrond is _always _like this. Sometimes he never tops talking. Well, he did while we brought him over to you but that's just because he was shivering so much. Usually – "

"How do you put a sling on?" Elrond sniffed, already beginning to forget whether ice or salve came first. He hadn't even asked what was in the salve.

"I'll show you, here," Niervän said, and gently took Elrond's arm. Elrond did his best to pay attention and commit Niervän's actions to memory but he simply couldn't imagine doing this same thing on a dog, it just didn't seem like it would work.

"What was _in_ that salve?"

"Pepper oil and arnica, and the tea I gave you was fennel."

_The tea!_ Elrond had completely forgotten about the tea. He wondered briefly how important _that _had been, but despair finally began to tear down his determination. Clearly, the healing arts were only for old elves who knew even more than young ellyth. It was useless. His efforts had been in vain, and now all he had was a really painful arm and a brother who was going to tease him until the end of time.

"How come this hurts so much?" he mumbled.

"What did you _expect_?" Chera said.

"It hurts because your body does not want its bones to break, and when something happens that your body does not want, it's going to hurt. Listen to your body and it will tell you if you're doing something wrong."

"How come the _dog _wasn't crying then?" asked Elrond.

"The dog? Which… oh, the wharf dog," Niervän said, and stood to begin situating the sling. "The wharf dog probably didn't break his leg, but like I said before, dogs are tough. Even a dog with a broken leg probably wouldn't cry much, because sometimes in nature crying only invites trouble."

Elrond blinked and really tried to keep his tears in check. He didn't want to invite any more trouble.

"Healer Niervän, I think the dog's leg was actually broken," said Chera. "It was snapped kind of, like Elrond's arm after he fell."

Niervän paused briefly in his sling construction, but continued then and didn't say anything until the sling was pinned in place and he'd once again sat down in front of Elrond.

"My little lord," the healer began, "please tell me you did not break your arm in order to learn how to fix the dog." Elrond heard the accusing tone and his heart jumped. He did not want Healer Niervän mad at him, but he did not want to lie.

"I didn't fall on purpose! That would have been insane."

Niervän regarded him for a long moment, and Elrond thought that maybe Niervän was reading his thoughts. But when the healer opened his mouth, it wasn't to accuse.

"I think you might just grow up to be a great healer, little Elrond."

At this, Elros snorted, and even Elrond sighed wretchedly.

"I can't heal," Elrond said. "I don't even know what bones look like."

"You have a lot of time to learn yet. And the most important thing about healing is compassion. That is the foundation upon which all healing arts are built. Nothing can be built upon a weak foundation. Now; I have taken mind of all other patients. Come, I will walk you to your house, and then I will see to this dog. Perhaps Elros and Chera can show me."

"_I'll_ show you where the dog is," said Elrond, standing suddenly, shocked that the healer would want to go through the terrible ordeal of fixing a broken arm twice in one day, but pleased and relieved that he wouldn't have to try to do it himself. "I can walk."

"That," said Niervän, going to his cupboards and retrieving some supplies, "is your vast compassion speaking. Also your inherited stubborn streak. Tell me, Lord Elrond, have you named the dog?"

"Named him?"

"You seem to have become fast friends already."

"Why would I name him? His parents probably already gave him a name, it's just he can't speak so I don't know it."

"… You make a good point." Niervän shuffled across the room and took a sachet of herbs down to place in his bag. "But what will you call him so he knows that it's him you're calling to?"

Elrond hadn't thought of that. Usually there were a lot of wharf dogs around; his friend might get confused.

"I'll just call him Dog Friend," Elrond said, because it seemed like the obvious thing.

"That's stupid," said Elros.

"No it's not," said Chera. "It's accurate."

Niervän chuckled and Elrond decided that it wasn't so stupid because ellyth knew a lot and Chera had said it was right. Elros picked up the sodden bag containing Elrond's wet, muddy clothing and for a moment as they left the healing ward Elrond's mind was surprised by the sudden conflict between trying to be resilient and tough like a dog and also compassionate like a healer but he still wasn't really sure what resilient meant, so instead he asked Niervän if the healer had remembered to bring the fennel tea, and if he'd ever reduced a dog's broken bone before, and precisely how many breaks it took before things didn't knit back together ever again.


End file.
